TrackMed system

Trackmed system uses QR codes and a mobile phone app to solve the problem of poor traceability and accountability in medical logistics.

When medicines reach the hospital store they have to be served to the different pharmacies located at the hospital for the patients to take according to their dosage and prescription, usually the process of dispensing these medicines to the patients is too manual and there's room for much error while entering the data into the Rxsolution off the paper written dosage. Trackmed addresses this problem by having a QR code sticker printer positioned at the hospital drug store where the medicine ordered by a particular pharmacy to the store through the Rxsolution is captured by number and name of medicine then generated into a QR code that is attached to the boxes going to the pharmacy, the patients are also made for special cards that have their UgandaEMR number turned into a QR code so that when dispensing the medicines the dispensing officer only needs to scan the QR code on patients card and the one on the box that contains the medicine from the store and the taken medicine is automacally deducted from the pharmacy stock without manually filling in any forms.  

Currently, there is much difficulty faced in the health supply chain of Uganda when tracking and tracing medicines downstream; that is from the store at the health center to the end patient. This has heavily impacted the delivery of free medicines to the patients and as a result has lowered the health standards of Ugandans. Currently, there is not enough reliable data about medicines downstream in the supply chain due to theft and poorly monitored delivery leading to difficulty in data driven decision making by stakeholders.

Trackmed system solution serves the people of Uganda that get free essential medicines through the government health centers.

People who get medicine from government health centers face a problem of medicine stock outs which comes as a result poor traceability and theft of medical supplies.

The solution is also going to benefit National Medical Stores (NMS) as it will allow them make data driven decisions on quantities and type of medicine to be supplied at particular health centers which will come along as data from medicine consumption at each health facility through the Trackmed system dash board. 

Trackmed system is a idea that was crafted during the SSCS challenge organised in Uganda by USAID and MSH to strengthen the medical supply chain of Uganda and Trackmed system came up as winners.

During the bootcamp of the competition we got to meet with subject matter experts and they described the problem and why it needs to be solved.

Trackmed system has been fine tuned by Gates and Bytes software developers with a team from Management Sciences for Health Uganda who are the subject matter experts.

Trackmed developers have also visited district health centers and got to see how the medical supply chain works and its flaws.

The development team carried out visits to government health facilities like Mulago hospital and got to see the electronic systems used and their weaknesses.

Gates and Bytes LTD got grant funding from USAID and we started developing the software and we shall be done with an MVP by end of June 2022.

The TrackMed system addresses the challenge above by using quick response codes, smart-phones and an internet connection to provide real time data downstream.

QR code stickers are attached on packages at the store requested by the pharmacy through RX solution. The QR code contains information about the drugs in the particular request. The packages are arranged on shelves in the pharmacy. Unique cards also having a quick response code are issued to the patients using data from Uganda EMR System. A doctor prescribes medicine to a patient and the prescription is logged into RX solution. A patient goes to the pharmacy with their plastic card and the prescription paper having the prescription and their patient number. A dispensary officer scans their card and information about their prescription pops up on a screen. The pharmacist picks the right medicine and scans the package they removed it from. This updates the stock status in RX solution. In the event that a patient misplaces their QR code card, the dispensary officer asks for their patient number and it’s entered into the app instead of scanning their card; other current health facility procedures remain unchanged. This allows traceability of medicines downstream in the supply chain in real time.

The company intends to pilot the project at about five health centers with the Makerere Joint AIDS Program clinic being a major center for testing because there is an uninterruptible power supply and internet access. This will allow for efficient testing and refining of the solution to ensure project success.

For testing we are going to work with around 16,000 patients but as we scale we can approximate to work with around 70,000 patients in 1 years.

• To integrate with the current systems running in the supply chain

The TrackMed system project aims at integrating with already existing systems at health centers. The two major systems in context are the RxSolution and the Electronic Medical Records {EMR} that medical personnel are used to working 

• To improve efficiency in the dispensing process at the various health centers:

The TrackMed system project will automate a variety of tasks and simplify other tasks involved in the process of dispensing drugs to patients. A mobile application that uses a scanning mechanism will be developed to simplify dispensing and taking records at that level.

• To ensure drug traceability from the health facility store to the end patients:

The TrackMed system project also aims at improving visibility in the health supply chain and provide real time data on drug delivery from the health facility store to the patient. This will be achieved through addition of QR codes and routine scanning processes to the current health supply chain routine. Information will be relayed via networks both local and online and this will strengthen the supply chain.

• The TrackMed system project will be developed with a web dashboard for viewing different statistics about drug consumption. 

The dashboard shall be updated in real time and will effectively supplement the auditing process that explicitly takes a longer time to provide required statistics.

• Web and mobile system authentication module ~ 2 weeks

• Collection of necessary metadata ~ 1 week
• Integration with the Electronic Medical Records system ~ 3 weeks
• Web module to generate patient QR codes ~ 2 weeks
• Printing Patient QR Code Cards ~ 2 weeks
• Integration with the RxSolution system for drug data collection ~ 3 weeks
• Web module to generate QR codes for stickers; at health facilities ~ 2 weeks
• Integration with the RxSolution system at drug dispensing ~ 3 weeks
• Mobile app module to scan patient cards and relay drug dispatch data ~ 3 weeks
• Mobile application completion ~ 3 weeks
• Web system dashboard ~ 2 weeks
• Web deployment to production server ~ 1 week
• Mobile app publishing to app stores~ 1 week
• Training of system users and publishing system user manuals ~ 2 week

• System piloting and deployment ~ 7 weeks:

The TrackMed system will be tested in chosen medical centers and the solution further refined to work in real life situations. Features will be added to the system and unnecessary features removed. A report will be made by the developers and concerned authorities about system performance. A successful deployment will result into system deployment at various health centers and possible scaling later to drug production level. 

BARRIERS:

• The TrackMed system project will depend on a wireless LAN access of the health facility in order to get data and information about drugs from the RxSolution system that is already in use, But most health facilities have wired LANs. The TrackMed system will integrate with this system in the back end to access this data. This will be done by the developers.

• The TrackMed mobile app will depend on access to the camera and storage features of the smartphones used to scan all quick response codes generated by the TrackMed system. This permission is to be granted by the owners of the smartphones hence Trackmed system will also require smart phones with good cameras and strong battery that can last a day for testing purposes.

• The successful implementation of the project will also depend on proper funding from the donors and support from concerned authorities in cases where vigorous testing and refining of the solution shall be required. This close collaboration should produce a viable product.

⦁ Consultant qualifications and experience:

Relevant knowledge and experience in software development
Familiarity of version control systems like git and use of various software libraries.
Solid understanding of the development and use of application programming interfaces (Api's).
Knowledge and experience of React Native and Android Studio.
Knowledge and experience of app publishing, web development and web hosting.
Experience with the use of QR code technology.

Our team met in high school and since then we have won local science fairs and some international competitions in IoT .

The members of the team are from both middle class and lower class citizens of Uganda who have gone through most of the problems we try to solve.

The team has also worked on 2 sets of financial software being used by some NGOs and schools as a source of income for the team/company members.  

Trackmed Systems is a project that is to be implemented by Gates and Bytes Ltd. The Project won an innovation organized by the USAID funded Uganda Strengthening Supply Chain Activity implemented by MSH, Management Sciences for Health. 

Trackmed system does not qaulify for The HP Girls Save the World Prize because it's not led by  girls aged 13-18.

We qualify for this prize because Trackmed system is accelerating healthcare access and health outcomes, reducing and ultimately, eliminating disparities in health.

We shall use the Pozen Social Innovation Prize to test and pilot Trackmed system in more health centers and also to fine tune the solution more to suite all kinds of health centers such as those that have no stable electricity and internet.