AliHealth piloted a new digitized solution this week for hospitals in Quzhou city, in Zhejiang province, allowing patients of chronic conditions to talk to doctors and have medication delivered home – using only their phones.

This comes as Alibaba Group’s healthcare arm looks to enhance the consumer experience in the health sector, such as through digitizing hospital journeys or rolling out 24/7 pharmacy delivery services in cities including Beijing, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Shenzhen and Wuhan.

“Patients with chronic diseases previously needed to repeatedly come back to the hospital, pay medical fees and pick up medication,” said Wang Zhengli, chief of the Quzhou City Healthcare Security Administration, adding that the new platform they jointly created with AliHealth now saves patients the trouble of making return visits and offers them the option of having their medicine delivered straight to home.

The new service would help shorten doctor visits from the conventional two hours to about 5 minutes, said AliHealth.

“Our goal has always been to provide chronic illness patients with healthcare services ‘at their fingertips,’ making it more convenient for them to see doctors and buy medicine, while improving efficiency in the healthcare space,” said Vice President of AliHealth Yang Feng.

Quzhou residents can access the platform via searching the keywords, “Quzhou City Internet Hospital Platform” or “Internet Hospital,” on the Alipay app. Currently, the People’s Hospital of Quzhou and the Zhejiang Quhua Hospital support the service, while AliHealth said it plans to further bring the service to more locations across the city.