MedStaffOnDemand

A customizable digital dashboard to help governments and health systems rapidly identify and triage available health care workers during public health crises 

Dr. Lee Squitieri will be the Team Lead for the solution. 

The Covid-19 pandemic has placed an untenable burden on governments, health systems, and health care workers around the world. Repeated waves of viral illness have led to unprecedented health care worker shortages and staff imbalances (e.g., ICU/nursing shortages with simultaneous cancellation of elective surgery resulting in furloughs/layoffs). These mismatches in health care workforce supply and demand not only jeopardize patient care but also compromise health system sustainability. Despite months of strain on the health care community and several viral variants that threaten future health system resilience, many economically developed and less developed countries still lack a systematic mechanism to rapidly identify available health care workers and efficiently triage them to geographic locations and health systems in need during public health crises. This is primarily due to the absence of critical data infrastructure regarding health care worker location, skillset, availability, and willingness to work in different high-risk work environments to inform real-time technology-based solutions. Furthermore, many countries do not have a systematic mechanism to identify retired health care workers or other medical ancillary staff (e.g., paramedics, medical assistants, surgical scrub technicians, dentists, veterinarians) that may be deployed during public health crises to bolster health system and health care worker resilience.

MedStaffOnDemand will serve governments, public health agencies, health systems, health care workers, and the general public in any geographic area where it is implemented. MedStaffOnDemand will help governments and public health agencies develop appropriate and efficient public health protocols by providing critical data infrastructure in real-time. Furthermore, by rapidly and efficiently connecting available health care workers with health systems in need, MedStaffOnDemand will facilitate necessary medical care and improve patient outcomes. Additional workforce relief will not only help patients affected by the pubilc health crisis but also help patients that require immediate medical assistance (e.g., trauma, heart attack/stroke victims) or services that should not be delayed (e.g., cancer screening/surgery). It will also provide flexible staffing options, which will improve health system resilience and reduce health care worker burnout.

For the proposed project, we will develop and implement our solution in 5 countries (2 developed and 3 developing) and work with Trinity Members to develop a plan for long-term sustainability. All deliverables will be made available in multiple languages and provided via an open-source or flexible licensing model so that the solution can equally benefit both developed and developing countries.  

MedStaffOnDemand will provide several public goods in the form of knowledge, data, services, and products (see list of devlierables below).  All deliverables will be made avaialble in multiple languages and provided via an open source or flexible licensing model so that the solution may equally benefit both developed and developing countries.

• Downloadable mobile app development platform and customized digital dashboard
• User toolkit (e.g., instruction materials) for health care workers and health systems
• Analytic toolkit (e.g., data methods) for governments and public health agenices to inform public policy
• RAND Report summarizing international experiences with health care worker staffing
• RAND Report summarizing pilot test results and best practices for dashboard implementation/dissemination 

The proposed digital dashboard will facilitate necessary medical care during public health crises by rapidly and efficiently connecting available health care workers with health systems in need. It will also provide governments, public health agencies, and health systems with necessary real-time data to appropriately and efficiently respond to public health crises. Finally, by providing health systems and health care workers with flexible staffing options, it will also improve health system resilience and reduce health care worker burnout during prolonged public health crises. We will provide open source versions of our solution and all deliverables in multiple languages at no-cost so that they may equally benefit both developed and developing countries in need of assistance.

The proposed project includes development of our digital app platform and implementation of a customized digital dashboard in 5 countries (2 developed, 3 developing) over three years. We will work with Trinity Members and our International Covid-19 Consortium to select study sites that include diversity in health care/data infrastructure.  Throughout the project, we will also seek additional government and private funding to scale our solution to other countries and geographic areas.  Finally, all deliverables will be made available in multiple languages and provided via an open-source or flexible licensing model so that the solution may equally benefit both developed and developing countries.

To evaluate the impact of our intervention we will assess the following metrics:

Number of countries and languages that have adopted our digital platform/dashboard

• Number of health care workers who register on the digital platform/dashboard
• Number of jobs that are posted by health systems
• Number of temporary employment arrangements that are facilitated by the digital dashboard
• Number of participating organizations (e.g., health departments, licensing agreements, industry partners)

 During the first two months of implementation in each country, we will also conduct bi-monthly process evaluations to inform future dashboard implementation and dissemination in subsequent locations.

Co-designing and implementing a digital platform with health care workers in a variety of countries will be challenging and our main barrier to success will be engaging stakeholders from various countries to participate in the design process and implement the intervention.  To mitigate this potential risk, we assembled an international Covid-19 consortium of physicians, health care policy experts, economic labor experts, and health care data/IT experts from our RAND U.S., Europe, and Australia offices. This consortium will engage stakeholders and organizations within each country during the co-design process and work with them to support uptake and implementation during the pilot test phase.  The consortium will also engage overarching international organizations (e.g., Red Cross, WHO) to support uptake and engagement within the five study sites and develop plans for expansion to additional countries and long-term sustainability.

RAND Corporation; RAND Europe; RAND Australia

The MIT Solve Trinity Challenge affords a unique opportunity for government, private industry, and academic research institutions to collaborate and develop a novel global solution to health care worker staffing shortages and imbalances. This solution has the potential to improve health system response and resilience during Covid-19 and all future public health crises that place undue stress on health care worker supply and demand (e.g., natural disasters, war).  Therefore, it is critically important for this solution to be accessible to all countries and populations that lack health care worker data infrastructure.  We believe that the MIT Solve Trinity Challenge provides the best opportunity to develop an equitable global solution that will not only benefit developed countries with robust data infrastructure, but also benefit developing countries through open source or flexible licensing deliverables in multiple languages. 

Although we have identified several potential technology partners, we are eager to collaborate with Trinity Members to improve our design, dissemination/scale our solution to additional countries, and develop long-term sustainability plans for both developed and developing countries.  At the present time, we do not have specific Trinity Members in mind.  We plan engage interested Trinity Members throughout our project and welcome opportunities to collaborate.  We will also present our results to all Trinity Members end of each Phase (Phase 1 = digital dashboard prototype, stakeholder interview results; Phase 2 = pilot study results, user toolkit, analytic toolkit) to leverage their collective expertise in developing long-term sustainability plans that suit the needs of both developed and developing countries.