Digital Health for Women and Girls

A Technology Entrepreneur and Executive, Joel is Founder and CEO of
CenHealth, a health technology company that specialises in digital health services and health technology solutions by leveraging emerging technologies; Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), Blockchain, Mobile apps and Cloud Computing.

With over 20 years of global experience under his belt in the areas of Technology, Strategy, IT Portfolio Management, Enterprise Resource Planning, Digital Transformation and Emerging Technologies. His skills and expertise have allowed him to thrive in the developed markets of UK, Europe and the US and deliver impact across various industries in emerging economies throughout East, South and West Africa.

As a business leader, Joel's excellent technical understanding of enterprise
related technologies, Information Systems, business strategy and emerging
technologies make him a formidable force in his field. In various contexts he has successfully translated his ability to develop innovative business models into substantial revenue growth.

Access, affordability and quality of healthcare is challenging in many African countries and this is particularly devastating for women most in need of the rudimentary basics of medicines, diagnostics, examinations and treatments.

Our solution is a Patient-centric digital health platform that is accessible to everyone and digitises the interactions between people and the healthcare ecosystem. The platform:

mHealth app – A Personal Health Records (PHRs) is developed as a mobile app and a Non-smart phone (USSD) solution. 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) - Health data is used to develop personalised insights into the patient’s health and wellness. 

Health devices makes a major difference in health outcomes. Affordable clinic and personal health devices that will be integrated into the patient’s mobile health record. With smart phone and USSD functionality.

Our innovation targets SDG 3 Goal: Ensure healthy lives and promote. Our goal is to contribute significantly to the achievement of Universal Health Coverage. 

Healthy women add significant economic value to a country. Without health and wellness for women, optimal socio-economic growth cannot be achieved. Our goal is to ensure that health is accessible, affordable and of high quality to all women and girls in the country, with a target of 5% of the targeted population engaging in our solutions.

In Sub-Saharan Africa in general has high maternal mortality ratios and under-5 mortality rates. The pregnancy experience of most women that are in the lower income level is not a pleasant one in terms of access and affordability. Evidence has shown that regular monitoring during the pregnancy journey, especially attending antenatal care, access to trained healthcare professionals and health literacy result in improved maternal health outcomes. 

Affordable access to health screening for women is not available:

80% incidence of cervical cancer in the developing world, 190,000 deaths (Western Journal of Medicine). Due to lack of HPV and Pap Smeat. In addition, poor quality cytologic services and inadequately trained technicians.

94,378 new cases of breast cancer are diagnosed in sub-Saharan Africa annually. (The Lancet Global Health report). Due to lack of access to basic Obstetric Point-of-Care.

Our digital health solution ultilises a multi-prong approach in addressing various functional requirements for the efficient and effective delivery of health services to women and children.

The Digital health platform for women and girls:

mHealth app – Our mobile Personal Health Records (PHRs) application protype is developed as a mobile app and a version for non-smart phones (USSD functionality). There is functionality to track women’s health and children’s health, including immunisation.

Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) - The Patient Generated Health Data (PGHD) is used to develop personalised insights into the patient’s health and wellness. This is particularly useful in the management of hypertension and diabetics. This is relevant and targeted to women with additional health risks (i.e. diabetics) during pregnancy. The data points collated, are also tied in with socio-economic data that track social determinants of health across various health communities in primary and secondary cities in Africa.

Health devices (Medical Internet of Things) – The use of medical IoT devices makes a major difference in health outcome. There are affordable clinic and hospital IoT devices that will be integrated into the patient’s mobile PHR. The solution is targeted at entry level smart phones and USSD functionality. 

Women’s health accounts for only 4% of the overall funding for research and development for healthcare products and services (Report by Frost and Sullivan) and women pay more in health insurance globally.

By introducing affordable health screening for women and girls, we are impacting health and wellness across society.

Advancing women’s equality can add $12 trillion to global growth by 2025 (Source: Mckinsey Global Institute). In Sub-Saharan Africa, the contribution is $300 billion by 2025. Imagine, the economic impact and growth by this incredibly significant contribution. In addition, the top 3 items of spend of a woman’s budget is Education, Health and Nutrition. This goes to show the great impact that will be made across society. 

The community cuts across both low- and middle-income women in rural, Secondary and primary cities in Africa. 

Our solution elevates humanity. It addresses the problem of access and affordability of healthcare services. Even women in primary cities in Africa cannot afford health screening services for breast cancer, Cervical cancer, Maternity screening during pregnancy. Complications arising from this, contributes to the costs of the health system, which could otherwise be avoided. 

By leveraging technology, we shall address quality in the use of digital health solutions and develop measurable health interventions for African cities. 

We developed a beta version of our Personal Health Record (PHR) mobile app and introduced this to the general market. The interaction and feedback from health conferences, LinkedIn and our Facebook followers was very encouraging. Our strategic partners in the Corporate Wellness and GP Practices sectors, expressed an interest in digital health solutions that address aspects of health, such as Non-Communicable diseases.

In the process of gathering requirements and understanding the challenges of medical professionals, the costs associated with the management of the maternity life cycle and women’s health in general was high due to the number of interactions with the healthcare team and costs for scanning services. A few leading companies have now introduced portable scanning devices, which are more affordable. Therefore, we explored incorporating these health devices into our solutions. 

My passion is based on making a difference and adding value to society. I am African and love the continent and due to my experience of living and working in countries like the UK, Netherlands, South Africa, Nigeria, and visited several EU countries as an IT expert developing and implementing systems, I am passionate to give back to my continent. 

Leadership - Commercial experience within global companies, Business Transformation, strong stakeholder, communication and relationship management with CXO personnel, 3rd party vendor management and off-shore team management experience. Managed teams of 20 – 50 people, including hands-on management of technical architecture, infrastructure and development teams. Mentoring and giving IT career development guidance to several Project Managers and Analysts during my career. 

Programme Management - Established track record delivering of large IT Programmes and Strategic Projects. Experienced in setting up PMO from scratch. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), including building delivery teams and selection of 3rd party companies to provide IT services. Accountability for managing major risks, resolving complex IT issues and ensuring quality assurance is in place. Expert in workshop facilitation, stakeholder management, including PPM tools such as Project Online, Primevera, SAP PS (Project Systems). Introducing project management frameworks that foster closer IT- Business collaboration, with consistency and transparency in the prioritisation of Business and IT initiatives.

Business Transformation – Development of technology/IT strategy and implementation of transformation roadmaps, Implementation of change management processes and procedures, including defining Target Operating Models (TOM). Experienced in applications consolidations and cost savings techniques across software and hardware assets. Governance, IT audit and compliance experience, including Business continuity. 

Cost Management – Budget forecasting, and definition of budget control mechanisms to proactively manage project spending (i.e. financial governance and delegation of authority (DoA) budget limits). Deep experience in Project financials and budgeting for programmes of over £10m and Project Portfolio value of £100m plus

In managing an outsourced development project, we experienced a major problem of the HR Solution not working and fit for purpose. This impacted the monthly payroll and threatened reputational damage of the organisation. 

My approach to resolve this situation was:

Pull all the parties and key stakeholders into a crisis meeting to resolve the following: The extent of the problem, the agreeable solutions for the short term and the resolutions required to fix the situation for the long term. 

By focusing on facts are discouraging "finger pointing and blame", I was able to forge ahead with a tactical solution that addressed the problem for the next 3 months. With the immediate pressure off, I set into motion understanding the legal obligations of the contract, the time frame to resolve to the "contract solution signed" and the recommendations for the executives to make in terms of the next steps. A communication plan was put in place during the duration of this crisis.  

The key skills that addressed this were my leadership, interpersonal and communication skills. My deep technical expertise, positioned me to make quick decisions regarding the technical resources, technical vendors and prioritisation of requirements both functional and non-functional. 

The situation I described above, actually highlighted my leadership ability. In addition I was the Programme and Portfolio Manager for the total of 75 projects, with a team of 20 direct reports. 

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The digital health platform and mHealth solutions proposed will integrate health devices (IoT) and mobile apps that are easy to use. Machine Learning (ML) and Artificail Intelligence (AI) algorithms are applied to the Patient Generated Health Data (PGHD) to enhance the patient experience and personalise monitoring and treatment.

A typical solution will include the following: mobile phone, health device, personal digital assistant (AI- powered chatbot). Our digital health solutions are rooted in 3 main pillars:

• Patient-centric model of health service delivery. This is the key driver to the development of any of our digital health solutions.
• Access to Healthcare - Affordable access to healthcare to facilitate pro-active prevention, diagnostics and treatment. This ensures that our patients are empowered, have portability of medical records and knowledgebase about health status. Portability of medical records by Patient.   
•  Technology -Delivering technology solutions that are "people literate", easy to use, highly intuitive and functional. The solutions will work on smart phones and Non-smart phones (by providing USSD functionality).

Problem Statement

In Sub-Saharan Africa in general has high maternal mortality ratios and under-5 mortality rates. The pregnancy experience of most women that are in the lower income level is not a pleasant one in terms of access and affordability. Evidence has shown that regular monitoring during the pregnancy journey, especially attending antenatal care, access to trained healthcare professionals and health literacy result in improved maternal health outcomes.

Target audience

Women and girls. As a knock-on impact, children will benefit from this initiative.

Plan of approach

Patient-centric model of health service delivery – This is the key driver to the development of any of our digital health solutions

Access to Healthcare – Affordable access to healthcare to facilitate pro-active prevention, diagnostics and treatment.

Benefits to Society

This ensures that our patients are empowered, have portability of medical records and knowledgebase about health status. Portability of medical records by Patient

Reducing the costs of public expenditure on healthcare, especially in the management of NCDs.

Key Performance Indicators:

Number of enrolled health consumers and patients

Number of enrolled Healthcare Professionals

Social media reach of people in Africa and engagement levels in health literacy topics.

Assumptions:

Adequate resources in terms of funds and key personnel to work and deliver of the key milestones for the duration of the project

Active engagement and input from our strategic stakeholders and Grant funders

Our 5 year goal is to impact and serve at least 4 -5% of the 10 - 12 African countries we have a presence in. This equates to about 20 million.

The Global impact:

The framework of our solutions has been designed to facilitate partnership with governments and alignment to their Country-led health plans. Our solutions build on existing national health plans and improve access to women and girls health services. 

By successfully implementing this digital health solution, we are contributing immensely to Health systems strengthening in the various African countries are solution is implemented.  

Our solutions take a holistic view of the entire healthcare ecosystem, we are able to partner with universities, research organisations and innovation centres. Thereby, contributing to researched and well-focused health interventions for women and child health.

Our innovation targets SDG 3 Goal: Ensure healthy lives and promote

We are addressing 3.4 of the SDG 3 goal, which is aimed at reducing by one third premature mortality from Non-communicable diseases by 2030. Our digital solutions address prevention, treatment and promotion of health wellbeing.

3.4.1 Mortality rate attributed to cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes or chronic respiratory disease

3.8 Achieve universal health coverage, including financial risk protection, access to quality essential health-care services and access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential medicines and vaccines for all

3.8.1 Coverage of essential health services (defined as the average coverage of essential services based on tracer interventions that include reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health, infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases and service capacity and access, among the general and the most disadvantaged population)

3.8.2 Proportion of population with large household expenditures on health as a share of total household expenditure or income

Interoperability and integration risks - into GP EHRs

Health device training and use, including privacy and security of data - We shall mitigate this risk by onboarding certified cyber security specialists.

Training of Healthcare professionals in use of digital solution - Training modules both online and offline will be developed.

Aggregation of results and progress and feed into municipal and government systems. This may be a cumbersome process and therefore active relationship engagement is required throughout the duration of the project from the onset.

There is risk of organisations that are resistant to embrace a patient-centric model Aggregation of community, regional, national level data

Identification of the different needs within various sub populations - This will be addressed by the surveys being undertaken.

Seamless collaboration across providers, patients and payers - challenging to ensure collaboration across the ecosystem. However, this is a key contributor to scale and must be addressed from the onset. Hence, we propose to create a "steering committee" that ensures transparent communication across all stakeholders. 

We have a partnership with the women's economic imperative. In which we are actively involved in the development of a Women's Economic Imperative Scorecard dashboard. The goal is to: The WEI Dashboard is intended to serve as a "scorecard" for providing data points across the communities in Sub-Saharan Africa. To create a meta index focused solely on the health of women and girls as an economic value. The healthcare sector has a high number of women in the workforce. By addressing this area, we are contributing to gender equality and social inclusion. We focus on women led health solutions in the development of our health content.

We need more strategic partners, for instance Mastercard and its inclusivity programme.

Here are the issues we are going to address: Analysis of the economic impact of poor health on productivity and growth across the continent as a starting point. Data available for this business case is subjective and the scope limited in comparison to the population in Africa that is impacted by poor health. How do we bridge this information gap? We need to extrapolate the economic figures attributed to the impact of women not being healthy and economically productive. What approach is best to achieve this? Economic impact on country GDP. On an industry sector basis, especially in sectors that have a high female workforce

The introduction of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and health insurance on a massive scale to make a difference to women who pay more in health insurance. 

Partnerships with health device companies (iHealthlabs)

Mobile device companies (currently in discussions)

Professional Services companies (Research, legal, Management, and Technology)

Emergency Services companies (In South Africa, ER24). 

Independent GP networks and Pharmacies (Under discussions in South Africa and Nigeria).

B2C and B2B, B2G. However, currently refining it. 

A combination of selling services, reseller partnerships and raising investments (if needed) to obtain scale.

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