DoctHers

Solution Summary

In Pakistan, over 60 percent of medical school graduates are women, yet only 25 percent of practicing doctors are women. To close this gap, DoctHers’ digital platform re-integrates women healthcare providers into the workforce by remotely connecting them to patients via trusted intermediaries.

These intermediaries are lower middle-income frontline health workers such as nurses and midwives. They are recruited, trained, and equipped with technology like tablets, software, and internet access so they can facilitate healthcare between patients and remotely located women doctors.  

Market Opportunity

• 50,000 licensed women doctors in Pakistan are not participating in the health workforce.
• 150 million people in Pakistan lack access to high-quality and affordable healthcare.
• Worldwide, 250,000 women doctors are not active in the global health workforce.

Highlights

• Partnered with Unilever to offer holistic health and wellness to sales distributors, leading to 40 percent reduction in staff turnover
• Reintegrated nearly 100 female healthcare providers into health workforce
• Successfully treated over 250 patients with HCV

Organization Goals

• Expand current model across South Asia
• Replicate model and expand into Middle East and Africa
• “Reverse innovate”—applying ideas from emerging economies to more developed economies—the DoctHers model to the US, with a focus on indigenous communities and 30 million uninsured

Existing Partnerships

DoctHers’ current partners include:

• GE Healthymagination
• Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship
• Innovations in Healthcare
• Corporate partners: Unilever, Reckitt Benckiser, Telenor, Cloudclinik, Accenture, Phillips, Augmentcare
• United Nations Development Programme
• UNICEF

Partnership Goals

DoctHers seeks:

• Impact evaluation and monitoring support
• Technology expertise in digital health
• Partners to integrate gender-inclusive health and wellness into value chains