Personalised is the keyword!

As Indians are becoming more health conscious, and the craze for fitness increases, the trend of personalised and custom made solutions is catching up; and the health and wellness industry is re-inventing itself to keep pace

Madhavi is a homemaker, and is busy with household chores; so much so that she finds it quite a task to make it to a gym regularly, and early morning walks are completely out of question; and this has left her fitness regime in doldrums.

She eventually found a personal trainer, who comes home to teach her Yoga for an hour, at a time that suits her. The trained Yoga teacher even gives her a daily dietary plan that she follows religiously, and she already feels better mentally and physically.

Sirish is a software lead, and all that he runs after are deadlines. He and several others like him in his organisation had neither the time nor the convenience to exercise every day.

In addition to an in-house gym, the company has enlisted a Yoga trainer, and it is mandatory for the entire staff to attend a Yoga session every Friday.

They have even tied up with an online wellness management service for all the employees. The employers have come to realise that a healthy organisation is but a byproduct of healthy employees.

A Zumba trainer, fitness instructor, nutritionist, gym, aerobics, power yoga; diet plans, doctor consultations; people are leaving no stone unturned to find ways and means to ensure a fit and healthy body, and with definitive increase in awareness towards wellness in recent times, better income and lesser time on hand – the upper middle class and neo-rich are engaging in personal fitness instructors and subscribing to online wellness programmes with one objective – overall wellness to lead a happy life.

This increased awareness has been proved by a recent survey ‘Lybrate Healthscape India 2016’, according to which, preventive health, gains ground; and averting the onset of lifestyle diseases tops the mind of young Indians. Lybrate, one of the largest online doctor consultation platforms further states that about 45 percent young people in the age group 25-45 consult doctors about prevention of health issues occurring because of an unhealthy lifestyle.

Wellness as a philosophy has been at the core of Indian tradition and that includes the age-old practices like Yoga and medicinal systems like Ayurveda and Unani. However, over the years Indians, swayed by the materialistic way of living started to adopt unhealthy practices and have increasingly fallen prey to lifestyle diseases like diabetes.

With lifestyles becoming more and more stressful, more so in urban India, even youngsters face health issues that include obesity and anxiety to depression, heart diseases and premature death.

A study published in mid-2015, based on the findings of a research, in a white paper released by the Confederation of Indian Industry and Academia, said that 25 percent of Indians are likely to die of lifestyle diseases before they are 70.

"Every year, roughly 5.8 million Indians die from heart and lung diseases, stroke, cancer, and diabetes. In other words, 1 in 4 Indians risks dying from non-communicable diseases before they reach the age of 70," the paper said.

However, the silver lining in the grim situation is the growing awareness towards preventive health care, and more and more people are moving towards wellness practices; and this trend is only set to grow. The NABH (National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Healthcare Providers) defines wellness as “a state of a healthy balance of the mind and body that results in overall well-being.”

And individuals and organisations are adopting practices that help in making the body strong and mind peaceful in order to combat the inevitable stress and strain associated with the modern world.
In order to cater to the increasing demand for consultants, nutritionists, health specialists, fitness experts and trainers, diet planners, who can guide the health conscious Indians in a systematic and professional manner, there is an industry that is growing along the way.

And in addition to following the concepts of modern medicine, this wellness industry is heavily drawing from the traditional Indian practices. And it has been majorly influential in bringing a shift in the practice of attributing wellness to luxury and transformed it into an essential facet of life.

As per a recent study by the Stanford Research Institute International, the global wellness industry represents a market of nearly US$ 2 trillion as opposed to the Indian Wellness Industry, which is at US$ 9.8 billion markets accounting, therefore, for less than two percent of the global wellness industry.

Yet, the overall wellness market in India is estimated at Rs 490 billion and wellness services alone comprise 40 percent of this market (ficci.in).

With industry trends looking so promising, and with more and more people inclined towards adopting a healthy lifestyle, several companies in wellness industry have pulled up their socks in order to cater to the new found demand in an exceedingly competitive sphere and subscribing to the requisites of the digital world.

One such player – Truworth Wellness – a health and wellness company is providing a fully-integrated platform for its customers. It was founded in 2010 as a health technology company and in 2013 it has re-invented itself as an online wellness provider to corporates and individuals.

Today, it caters to companies like Microsoft, HP, Dell, Deutsche Bank. Truworth in addition to providing on-site diagnostic services just like several others in the field like ‘Callhealth’; also has empanelled consultants and doctors, who provide their services regularly to the members.

Truworth has taken their level of wellness services another step ahead as it tied up with a health food company called ‘LeanSpoon’. Together they enable the users to order healthy, well-balanced meals that match up to their personal nutrition requirements, ‘as advised by the nutritionists’ based on their medical history, family history of illnesses and lifestyle.

“Most of the employees in the corporates, work away from home. And when we provide nutritional consultancy to them and give them a diet plan, they find it difficult to follow the plan.

Our partnership has one core mission, which is fulfilling the needs of our customers, who often find it difficult to manage their diet, most of the times due to non-availability of prescribed items,” shared Truworth CEO Rajesh Mundra.

Yet another company Gympik, the Bengaluru-based online fitness discovery platform enables people to find any kind of fitness and wellness related activities from every nook and corner of India. Its mission is to touch the lives of people by connecting them to most convenient ways of leading a fit and healthy lifestyle.

It offers cloud-based software and an app for fitness centers to make their offerings more personalised. Gympik picks personal trainer according to the need and lifestyle of the customer after counseling and has access to 12000 finest fitness centers in India.

Time is indeed ripe for wellness industry to bloom and become big in India, and the trend is not just about fitness and wellness companies; from personal fitness trainers to dieticians and consultants - everyone is leveraging on the new-found interest in fitness and are making the hay while the sun continues to shine bright and healthy.