The African continent has its fair share of issues around health and poverty, with many of those who urgently require the support of a modern healthcare system having limited to no access to one. However, medical practitioners, technology geniuses and inspirational human beings have started developing solutions that are designed to combat these legacy issues.
One such solution designed to support those who live in rural areas where healthcare is largely inaccessible is hearScreen. This app detects hearing loss by using low-cost, commercially available hardware along with a custom-developed software application.
"The World Health Organisation expects disabling hearing loss to be the seventh most significant contributor to the global burden of disease by 2030 among all communicable and non-communicable diseases," says Professor De Wet Swanepoel, audiologist at the Department of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology. "Also, 80% of the world's 360 million people who suffer from disabling hearing loss live in developing countries where hearing healthcare is mostly inaccessible."
The solution has been used to screen over 1 000 children in Tshwane over the past year, identifying more than 25 children with hearing loss, and is being piloted by healthcare workers in Mamelodi. hearScreen undercuts the costs of current screen audiometers by 300% to 400% and is user-friendly enough to be operated by anyone, even those who cannot read. It has significant potential in areas where children are not tested before entering school and their education suffers as a result of an undiagnosed hearing problem.
Inside and out
Another South African innovation developed by a local health startup, SA Cardiosynthetics, is a prosthetic aortic valve. This is currently in its pioneering phase and has been designed to address the needs of emerging market patients and children under 16 who need an aortic valve replacement. The startup, co-founded by Professor David Wheatley and Doctor Murray Legg, has worked hard to ensure that the cost of producing the valve is kept as low as possible in order to remain accessible to patients who previously could not have afforded the solution.
"We're at the stage of commercialisation for a valve replacement for emerging markets," says Dr Legg. "People who need valve replacements because of illness or other contributing factors only have access to two solutions - mechanical or tissue valve. Both cost a lot of money to install and maintain."
Then there's an e-Health platform called SATMED, which was devised by SES and supported by the Luxembourg government and its Ministry for Cooperation and Humanitarian Action.
"E-Health is known to improve medical quality and facilitate the access to care and education," says Ibrahima Guimba-Saidou, senior VP, Commercial Africa, SES. "However, its use in Africa is still limited because high-quality e-Health tools are often expensive and need resources for implementation and maintenance, and existing tools have poor interoperability."
SATMED's goal was to overcome these barriers by improving accessibility by blending mobile and satellite to enhance the internet, make the use of e-Health tools simpler, as well as more affordable and interoperable. The solution has the potential to dramatically improve access to care. Patients can be remotely diagnosed by experts thousands of kilometres away and medical professionals have access to information that can keep them trained and updated on procedures and treatments. The initial rollout of this platform in Africa took place in Sierra Leone in support of the fight against Ebola.
"The Fight Ebola channel is broadcast via satellite in West Africa and informs populations in affected areas about the nature of the disease and other essential information about Ebola and is available on free-to-air TV and Pay TV," says Guimba-Saidou. "The channel broadcasts content, which is endorsed by the Luxembourg Ministry of Health, from multiple sources to millions of people."
Shifting dramatically from a deadly disease to the start of a new life, the Philips Wind-up Foetal Doppler is another innovation set to hit the continent in 2015. It was originally designed by PowerFree Education Technology (PET), a South African NGO, and was market-tested in Uganda. Since then, Philips has undertaken further development to create a device that's designed to step in where current methods are too expensive, inaccurate or reliant on batteries and electricity.
"This new ultrasound accurately counts the foetal heart rate while the mother is in labour," says Maarten van Herpen, head of the Philips Africa Innovation Hub. "It has a back-up wind-up power feature, is easy to use and extra-robust. We want the Wind-up Foetal Doppler to help midwives and nurses working in low-resource settings in Africa."
This solution has enormous potential to prevent the unnecessary deaths of mothers and infants due to complications during childbirth.
"PET invested many years in the development of this idea," says Van Herpen. "I'm honoured that PET chose Philips as the company to commercialise it and make it available across Africa."
Students at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology along with The Open Medicine Project have created mTriage. This app rapidly assesses patients in emergency departments, reduces triage time, improves the accuracy of assessments and is suited to war-torn areas or those struck by natural disasters. It's a huge step forward for those in health battling with limited resources and inadequate training.
This new ultrasound accurately counts the foetal heart rate while the mother is in labour.
Maarten van Herpen, Philips Africa Innovation Hub
FOLUP is another secure mobile and web-based health communication solution that connects doctors, patients and numerous medical organisations.
"Our chief medical officer, Geoffrey Appelboon, saw a teenage patient five years ago suffering from headaches and nausea," says Simon Spurr, head of Operations at Folup SA. "The problem was she forgot to specify her symptoms - she didn't think it was important. The reality was that she had an inoperable brain tumour. Geoff realised that constant feedback from patients is extremely valuable and that technology should help us gather this information."
Folup has been developed with an open Application Programming Interface (API), so wireless devices can be integrated to capture data automatically and the results from wearable devices sync automatically with a user's Folup profile. It's also accessible on a mobile phone, making it ideal for use across the continent and in more remote areas.
This is only a taste of some of the incredible medical solutions that have been developed for the African market. They take the vast rural spaces, poverty and educational issues into account and provide muchneeded health support and care to those who need it the most, and in the most innovative and remarkable ways.
This article was first published in Brainstorm magazine. Click here to read the complete article at the Brainstorm website.
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