Dr. Jagdish Chaturvedi is a multifaceted individual balancing his career as an ENT surgeon and stand-up comedian. By day, he works at Bengaluru’s Fortis Hospital, and by night, he performs comedy, often finding his audience asking for medical advice instead of selfies. Behind his humor lies a pioneering innovator who has significantly impacted the medical field, especially in rural areas.
Dr. Jagdish’s journey in medical innovation began in 2008 during his training. His first invention was a cost-effective alternative to expensive imaging equipment for diagnosing throat cancer, inspired by the plight of farmers who developed early-stage cancers from inhaling stubble fire. In rural areas, rudimentary tools like mirrors were inadequate, so he attached a small camera to an endoscope. This “jugaad” led to a prototype that he eventually launched in the market to aid rural doctors.
However, Dr. Jagdish faced significant resistance. Initially, there were no takers or encouragement, except from his senior professors in the ENT department. Despite backlash from the medical community, who believed he should focus on his job, he persevered. He licensed his prototype to Icarus, which sold it to Medtronic. The Medtronic Shruti ENTraview Otoscope, part of the Shruti ear care programme, has since helped around seven lakh people.
Dr. Jagdish’s first innovation provided valuable lessons. Realizing the need for a mindset change among the medical fraternity regarding innovations, he sought to gain the necessary knowledge and skills. With encouragement from his senior professor, Dr. Ravi Nair, he enrolled in the Stanford bio-design program in 2012. This fellowship taught him to approach design with affordability and accessibility in mind, making his second innovation, Noxeno, a device to remove foreign bodies from children’s noses without invasive surgery, a smoother process. Noxeno is now used in 1,000 hospitals and was featured in News Asia’s documentary ‘Field Guide to Innovations’ in 2017.
His latest invention is a tele-examination system allowing doctors to examine patients remotely using a camera device that looks inside the ears and nose. This device has been successfully piloted on a thousand children.
In 2018, Dr. Jagdish founded HiiiH, a digital platform connecting doctors, engineers, and entrepreneurs to foster medical innovations. The platform has supported 40 Indian startups through guidance, funding, and product development. Over the past decade, he has developed 18 devices, including a bowel cleaning device, Esophageal varices management device, and medicine management box.
Reflecting on the changes in medical innovations over the last decade, Dr. Jagdish notes a positive shift with numerous supportive programs like the Atal Incubation Centre and ICMR CLiMB programme, along with increased entrepreneurial opportunities. Despite skepticism from some doctors about his comedy career, he has performed nearly 400 shows globally, proving that his humor and medical expertise can coexist, evidenced by the post-show queues seeking his medical advice.
