26 October 2017
mHealth4Afrika is co-designing a modular adaptable and extensible multilingual framework that integrates Electronic Medical Records and Electronic Health Record functionality with medical sensors and data visualisation tools. It is co-designed in cooperation with Ministries of Health, district health officers, clinic managers and health workers in primary healthcare facilities in resource constrained urban, rural and deep rural environments in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi and South Africa.
mHealth4Afrika undertook a validation of the alpha prototype with 49 participants from 14 healthcare clinics with health clinics in Ethiopia (North Gondar), Malawi (Zomba and Machinga Districts), Kenya (Bungoma County) and South Africa (Eastern Cape) November - December 2016, using a mix of observation and semi-structured interviews.
The results from the alpha validation was published in the proceedings for the Global Humanitarian Technology Conference and presented in the Scientific Programme by Paul Cunningham, IIMC (mHealth4Afrika Coordinator) on 20 October 2017 - Cunningham, M., Cunningham, P., van Greunen, D., Veldsman, A., Kanjo, C., Kweyu, E. and Tilahun, B. (2017) mHealth4Afrika Alpha Validation in Rural and Deep Rural Clinics in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi and South Africa, Proceedings of IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC) 2017, IEEE Xplore, ISBN: 978-1-5090-6046-7, DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239347
The alpha validation was a very productive exercise, providing valuable insights into how the healthcare workers will use the platform, usability and appropriateness of the alpha platform functionality and the data flow that they expect in the beta platform. These findings have informed the co-design of the mHealth4Afrika beta platform, which will be installed in participating clinics on a phased basis during Q3 2017.
IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC) is a cross-disciplinary annual conference focused on advancing technology for the benefit of humanity in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals. GHTC brings together stakeholders from the public, private, education and research and societal (not-for-profit) sectors to address the critical issues for the benefit of the resource-constrained and vulnerable populations in the world.
mHealth4Afrika undertook a series of briefing meetings around the presentation at GHTC with USAID, National Science Foundation and National Institute of Health. Paul Cunningham presented a case study on mHealth4Afrika during an IEEE SSIT Distinguished Lecture at San Francisco State University on 23 October and at UC Berkeley on 25 October 2017. These meetings were productive raising awareness of mHealth4Afrika achievements to date.