healthcare technology

The idea of a "virtual doctor" project might sound rather futuristic.

Zambia has about 1,600 doctors for a population of 14 million, and two-thirds of these are working in towns and cities, while most of the country's population is in the countryside.

It means access to good quality health care is often difficult if not impossible.

For many communities, it is not practical to expect sick and frail people to walk or cycle for hours to hospital.

So families depend on rural health centres, which have health workers but no qualified doctors.

The virtual doctors project means that these isolated health centres can be supported by doctors thousands of miles away.

Health workers and clinical officers on the ground use an app on a smartphone or tablet computer to take notes on a patient's symptoms and photographs.

This information is sent to a volunteer doctor in the UK who helps with a diagnosis and recommends treatment.  Cases are directed towards doctors with a relevant specialism, whether it is skin diseases or HIV and Aids-related problems.

The doctor in the UK will have a list of the drugs and equipment kept in the health centre in Zambia and can suggest treatment or further tests based on what is practical and available.

Virtual Doctors is now supporting 19 rural health centres, which typically deal with problems such as malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/Aids and pregnancy-related conditions.

EMRs-Electronic Medical Records are a modern revolution in the field of healthcare improving the standards of quality in healthcare and raising it to a higher level. With all the numerous benefits of EMRs to doctors, it eventually signifies the benefits to patients and thereby improves patient care.

Using EMR in medical practice can improve patient care in the following ways:

The Ministry of Health and the Ghana Health Service has engaged the services of Lightwave ehealthcare Services (LWEHS) to roll out an integrated health care solution that includes a Centralized data center with a 24 hour recovery unit to serve as an infrastructure platform for a patient-centered health care solution.

The solution will network all health facilities including agencies of the Ministry of Health, provide electronic Medical records for care seekers, enable and facilitate tele medicine, and develop a a real time bio-surveillance system – which will support the fight against disease outbreaks and the spread of communicable disease.

The system which integrates with the current National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) enables the development of a patient management system – this will streamline the Admission, discharge and transfer process of healthcare.

Chief Technology Officer of Lightwave Mr Thomas Mac Scofield, said the project was a culmination of years of planning and working with the MOH to bring ehealth solutions to the public health care industry.

Nrip Nihalani consulting director with LightWave revealed to Ghanahealthnest.com that the project follows Ghana’s Data privacy and HIPAA laws to ensure its safety.

He added that, the time was right for Ghana as most countries have gone ahead and made significant mistakes. “Ghana is at the absolute time with the technologies, the budgets, the preparedness all meeting together to launch its e-health”, Nrip intoned.

more at : http://ghanahealthnest.com/nationwide-paperless-ehealth-project-commenced-ghana/