Yonkofa Biometric EMR & Outbreak Map

The primary problem we address is information asymmetry and disjointed tracking of vaccination programs, diagnostic tests, and infectious diseases in hard to reach communities in rural Ghana and beyond. Given the disjointed and outdated medical records systems, migration patterns of agricultural communities & refugee populations, and the lack of coordination among international NGOs, there is inconsistent care, inadequate analytics, and inefficient delivery of healthcare in the areas that need it most.  Furthermore, the emergence of yet another pandemic underscores the vulnerability of the global population and the infrastructure required to slow and track the spread of any emerging outbreak.  

By leveraging proven iris-scanning biometric technology, our application has demonstrated that medical records, test results, and vaccination history can accurately and safely follow the patient vs being lost or duplicated on paper - while tracking relationships through our unique functionality to better understand potential outbreak risks within households and regional populations.

The underlying digital infrastructure and analytics required to deliver meaningful and accurate medical care in rural Ghana is inadequate.  For example, the Aowin District in Ghana's Western Region (in which our consortium has constructed and delivered 3 clinics in collaboration with Ghana Health Services) has a population of nearly 200,000 including transients, one hospital, a decentralized network of approximately 30 clinics, and only 2 medical doctors and surgeons on staff - all using a decentralized, folder-based, paper medical records system.  

Whether it is general medical treatments, managing vaccination campaigns, or developing a rapid response strategy to slow or track a contagion, an accurate and innovative record-keeping methodology and analytics program is essential - the urgency of which is highlighted by the emergence and spread of COVID-19 - and current systems in place are neither accurate nor innovative.  

By developing our proven methodology for accurately documenting patient visits, patient relationships, testing programs, and vaccination campaigns, our solution not only improves the accuracy and efficiency of medical treatment and limits duplicate records and other costly inefficiencies (both in time and money), but lays the groundwork for a reliable and real-time analytics platform to identify at-risk populations and potential outbreak clusters. 

While our application effectively creates a centralized medical records platform that leverages biometrics technology to ensure accuracy, our relationship tracking functionality is what excites us most about its potential impact and efficacy.  Medical visits in Ghana can be quite different than ones elsewhere, and our application leverages these differences vs attempting to factor them out.

After years of observing clinical workflows/patient journeys, we localized the application to fit regional realities of the healthcare system.  While the fundamentals details of patient visits, vaccination program, community rapid testing (i.e. COVID-19), and treatments are tracked as part of a patient's complete history, the ability to trace a patient's relationships may curb epidemics - before they occur.  

By registering the biometric data of patients, and connecting those records to relatives, caregivers, and the broader community, we can quickly identify at-risk subsets if a patient tests positive for a virus or highly contagious illness - therefore giving local providers predictive insights to potential clusters.  For example, if a patient tests positive for COVID-19, and they live with 3 people over the age of 70, staff can dedicate resources and implement extraordinary preventive measures vs a COVID-19 positive patient who lives alone.  

In the years of building clinics and delivering much-needed healthcare in Ghana, our team has been able to observe and understand the nuances in the patient journey, and how healthcare is managed and delivered locally.  Furthermore, given some of our team's expertise as healthcare professionals in the US, there is the added benefit of being able to compare and contrast the systems and experiences to implement meaningful solutions and change.  

It is through this lens we designed our biometrics solution and its focus on accurately tracking test results, community relationships, vaccination campaigns, and complete medical histories.  The system's effectiveness will only be as successful as its level of stakeholder inclusion. 

This was built with the Ghanaian patient and their realities in mind.  We achieved this through years of observation, rounds of user testing and use-cases in the field, while also working with our local team on developing implementation plans that hopefully will place local systems administrators and user-training leaders at the center of the strategy.  As we implement this application in more clinics, we will need to identify and train technical leads, as well as train staff on the basic functionality and use of the solution.  

The accuracy of biometrics technology coupled with our novel relationship tracking/cluster schema will ensure areas with inadequate infrastructure and data can leverage our solution to:

• track vaccination, vitamin A, neglected tropical disease campaigns, etc. to ensure optimized efficiency and reach. (Eliminate duplication of efforts by decentralized NGOs and others.)

• accurately track test results and develop equally accurate disease surveillance systems

• use data sets to develop rapid response programs and implement mitigation measures efficiently through enhanced decision making

• Use data to effectively allocate typically scarce resources and shape public health policy. 

• introduce digital transformation and innovation to healthcare in rural Ghana.