Healthlytic

Healthlytic offers cloud-based electronic health records to help patients living with chronic diseases and their health providers access patients' health information to facilitate informed medical diagnosis and to save lives.

Nigeria has a rapidly growing population of 211,400,000, however, about 64.9% of this population is living with chronic diseases such as diabetes, ulcer, etc., and have a higher tendency of having a medical emergency to visit the hospital more times in a year than the average person. Meanwhile, the healthcare sector in Nigeria is facing significant challenges, one of which is the lack of effective and efficient healthcare information management systems. This is where electronic health records (EHRs) come in, as they provide a digital solution for managing and sharing patient information, which can help to improve the quality of care and reduce the risk of errors.

However, the adoption of EHRs in Nigeria is hindered by several barriers such as poor internet connectivity, lack of standardization in the healthcare sector, shortage of trained healthcare professionals, and lack of trust from patients and healthcare providers. As a result, over 75% of hospitals in Nigeria still keep patients' medical records on paper which delays diagnosis during emergency situations. More so, studies have shown that most deaths (about 43.6%) in the emergency departments of Nigerian hospitals occur within 24hrs after admission which can be traced to delayed medical diagnosis during emergencies. Therefore, to thrive through these barriers and break into the market, Healthlytic must focus on developing solutions that are tailored to the specific needs of the Nigerian healthcare system.

The main problem Healthlytic is trying to solve here is the lack of effective and efficient healthcare information management systems and this is a critical problem because it leads to reduced quality of care, increased costs, and poor patient outcomes. All of these contribute to the increased death rate recorded in the emergency departments of hospitals in Nigeria.

In summary, Healthlytic is on a mission to make a significant impact on the healthcare sector by improving the quality of care, reducing the risk of errors, and improving patient health outcomes. However, it must first address the challenges of poor internet connectivity, lack of trained healthcare professionals, and lack of trust from patients and healthcare providers. By developing solutions that are tailored to the specific needs of the Nigerian healthcare system and ensuring that the solutions are easy to use, reliable, and secure, Healthlytic can help to improve the overall efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare delivery in Nigeria.

Healthlytic offers a cloud-based Electronic Health Records (EHRs) system that holds a digital representation of patients' health information in real-time and can greatly facilitate informed clinical decision-making. By using cloud-based technology, Healthlytic can help to mitigate the challenges of poor internet connectivity by providing access to patient information from any location, offline access, data backup and recovery, scalability, and cost-effectiveness. This can help to improve the overall efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare delivery, even in areas where internet connectivity is poor. 

This EHR solution will allow patients to access their physician’s notes about their health condition after an appointment with the physician. These notes will include a detailed interpretation of the results of clinical tests conducted, treatment prescriptions, and other relevant clinical advice. This will save lives and give both patients and their subsequent physicians a clear understanding of their state of health and how best to manage their health conditions. Having an electronic version of physician notes and prescriptions will greatly eliminate the difficulty patients and pharmacists face with reading out the illegible (unclear) writing patterns of most doctors’ prescription notes for patient treatment. 

This will further facilitate patients' treatment and eliminate delays in purchasing prescribed drugs as a result of these illegible physician notes in Nigeria. More importantly, the EHR solution will be designed to include a feedback feature to allow patients to send feedback to the physician after receiving their physician notes, especially after an appointment. This feedback feature will help create a two-way communication channel between the health provider and patient, improving patient understanding of their health condition. Following the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the EHR solution provided by Healthlytic contributes tremendously to SDG 3 - Good health and well-being and also to SDGs 10 & 12 on the sideline.

The target population whose lives Healthlytic is working to directly improve are the patients and healthcare providers in Nigeria.

Patients:  This population is currently underserved in several ways, one such way is that they find it difficult to access their medical records or transfer them to new healthcare providers, especially during emergencies. However, our EHR solution can improve the lives of patients by providing healthcare providers with quick and easy access to accurate and up-to-date patient information. Our target customers here are patients living with chronic illnesses and those with complex care needs. They make up 64.9% of the Nigerian population and have a high tendency to visit the hospital in an emergency than an average person. Our EHR solution can help to improve the quality of care, reduce the risk of errors, and increase the chances of positive patient outcomes for this population. Additionally, patients can have easy access to their medical records, which can help them make more informed decisions about their own health care, and also make it easier for them to change healthcare providers if they wish to.

Healthcare Providers: Currently, over 75% of all 39,550 hospitals in Nigeria are underserved by the lack of effective healthcare information management systems. Many healthcare providers still rely on paper-based records, which are prone to errors, difficult to access and share, and can be lost or damaged easily. Additionally, paper records can be time-consuming and costly to manage. However, Healthlytic's EHR solution can also improve the lives of healthcare providers by making it easier for them to manage patient information. This can help to increase the efficiency of the healthcare system, reduce the risk of errors, and increase the chances of positive patient outcomes. Additionally, our solution can help healthcare providers to improve communication and collaboration with other healthcare providers, which can lead to better patient outcomes.

Obinna Ezeani (Founder): Obinna is a Biochemist, a Public Health Expert, and a Digital Health Enthusiast with over 3 years of work experience in the public health sector. He has experience in UI/UX Product Design and Frontend Web Development. As the Founder and Project Team Lead, Obinna's personal experiences spurred his interest and makes him the right person to design and develop the electronic health records system for the Nigerian health system. Here's Obinna's unique story, "Four years ago, my little cousin of six years was diagnosed with tumor growth, and surgery was conducted to remove the tumor. Two years later, when he came to spend his summer holiday with my uncle and me, he had a health emergency where he vomited lots of blood and was rushed to a hospital different from the one he previously had surgery. Unfortunately,  the hospital he was rushed to had no access to electronic health records which could have helped the doctors make an informed decision about my cousin’s condition. As a result of this, the doctors were limited with the necessary medical history to make an informed diagnosis thus, this delayed treatment for about 4 days, which led to severe complications. This incident underscores the need for electronic health records to facilitate informed clinical decision-making and improve patients’ health outcomes."  This experience further spurred Obinna's interest to build a social enterprise focused on providing effective electronic health records services within his community and beyond.

Sandra Osademe (Project Manager): Sandra is an Anatomist by discipline and a seasoned Project Manager with relevant work experience. She is currently an M.Sc. student in Forensic Science at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. As an Anatomist and a Forensic Scientist in training, Sandra has witnessed several families lose their loved ones in her line of duty and understands the burden such experience puts on these families. She has also held supporting roles during autopsies and understands that a good number of cases involved avoidable deaths only if there were effective healthcare delivery services in place. Hence, these experiences spurred her interest to take proactive steps to help design digital solutions to mitigate these avoidable deaths and improve patient outcomes thereby preventing other families from experiencing the heavy burden of losing a loved one. 

Anthony Ezeani (Legal Counsel): Anthony is the Legal Counsel at Healthlytic with experience in Corporate Law and Intellectual Property Law in the Nigerian corporate space. Anthony had challenging childhood due to recurring health challenges which have over time been treated. Thus, he is very passionate about saving lives and improving the health outcomes of children who may be having similar challenges in their childhood.

Esther Abiola (UI/UX Product Designer): Esther is a UI/UX Product Designer with experience in designing and interpreting user research to identify the needs of the target customers and leveraging these interpretations to design user-friendly interfaces for digital solutions. Esther is also enthusiastic about solving social challenges and using her skills to save lives.

Etoo Obinwa (Accounting/Financial Officer): Etoo is a Financial Analyst with a passion for business performance analysis and market forecasts. He is also a trained Product Manager and he is eager to leverage his skills and expertise to save lives while solving challenges within his community.

At Healthlytic, understanding the problems of our potential users is a critical step to helping us design an innovative solution that meets their needs. To ensure a human-centered design, we are using the design thinking process to develop our solution to ensure that we meet the needs of our target users.

First, we started by conducting research to understand the specific challenge that we want to solve, who is affected, and how this problem affects people in our community. This research was documented and presented at an International E-health Conference held in Prague, Czech Republic in 2020, and was further published in the Health System and Policy Research Journal in 2021. After our initial research, we empathized with the people we identified, who are affected by speaking with people within our community and further researching their specific needs, pain points, experiences, and motivations. 

Next, to better define our niche and understand our market, we documented our user's needs and problems. This stage gave us clarity, focus, and definition. We began to make meaning of the landscape we are exploring; what unmet needs can we identify from our research so far? What unexpected barriers might shift our focus? Are we asking the right questions, and do we need to reassess our assumptions about the problem?

Currently, we are testing, challenging our assumptions, and unleashing our creativity to design our product. We are conducting our market validation process through digital surveys with features in place to protect the confidentiality and privacy of our respondents. Our surveys are designed in a way to help shape our focus on the type of features and the user's expectations of our solution to meet their needs. Our questions are divided into 3 major categories: 

• To identify the past experiences of our users.
• To identify their expectations of the kind of solution that will meet their needs.
• To identify their willingness to purchase and use our solution.

There are existing companies in Nigeria that offer health data management systems in some healthcare institutions in Nigeria. However, most of these companies offer Electronic Medical Records (EMRs). Although Electronic Medical Records and Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are used interchangeably in some contexts, there are slight differences between both systems in that EHRs offer an important additional feature to the services provided by most EMRs. This additional feature sets EHRs on a high pedestal to squarely tackle the challenges of poor health data quality and inconsistencies in health data reporting and sharing methods as seen in the past decades. This additional feature of EHRs is that it allows patients to move around and share their health information with their health providers, unlike EMRs which are designed to be domiciled within a health institution.  In the ensuing paragraphs, I will address better this additional feature and how it differs from the products offered by my competitors.

Helium Health is a leading telehealth company that provides EMR services to hospitals in Nigeria and beyond. However, the EMR services provided by Helium Health are domiciled within a health institution and do not allow patients to move around or easily share their health records with a new health provider. Although Helium Health has a separate product ‘HeliumDoc’ that allows users to book appointments with health providers and access their health records, this service is limited to only users who patronize a Helium Health-powered facility. Thus, this approach creates a gap between low-income individuals living in an underserved population who may not have access to visit a Helium Health-powered facility. This defeats the United Nations 2030 Goals for equitable access to quality health services. On the other hand, Healthlytic offers a cloud-based service that can be accessed anywhere with an internet connection, and users (patients) can create their secured accounts with us and are encouraged to request their health providers to upload their health records to their portals. This facilitates a sense of partnership between health providers and their patients and encourages patients to be more active participants in their care than passive participants which depicts our goal and vision at Healthlytic. More importantly, it aligns with the UN’s 2030 Goals for equitable healthcare for all.

SwiftPractice EMR is another telehealth company that provides medical software such as an EMR to Nigerian hospitals. From the brief description, one can easily deduce that this entity operates with the B2B business model where its major customer base is Nigerian Hospitals. This may seem well at first sight and shows specificity however, it also narrows down the company’s reach to potential customers who are the lifeline of every business. In contrast, Healthlytic operates both a B2B and a B2C business model which increases our customer base and enables broader positive impacts compared to our competitors. Healthlytic aims to foster a sense of partnership between health providers and their patients thus, encouraging patients to be more involved in their healthcare process. We aim to sensitize patients on the benefits of having an electronic health record, its cost-effectiveness, and the improvement of health outcomes thus, we will encourage patients to request their health providers to always upload their health information to their portals. This strategy also sets up these users to be mini-ambassadors of the Healthlytic brand and to help spread the word about our EHR solution, particularly to health providers who are yet to come on board with our platform.

Our impact goals for the next year include the following:

• Save lives: We hope to reduce the death rate in emergency departments in Nigerian hospitals by improving patients' & health providers' access to patient's health information during medical emergencies through our EHR solution. This contributes to SDG 3 of the United Nations (Good Health and Wellbeing).
• Strengthen the Nigerian Health System: According to the World Health Organization, having a robust and effective health information management system can strengthen a nation's ability to achieve universal health coverage. Thus, through Healthlytic's EHR solution, we will help strengthen the Nigerian health system and the fight against COVID-19 and future epidemic outbreaks.
• Waste Reduction: By digitalizing the healthcare administrative processes in Nigeria, we hope to significantly reduce our over-dependence on paper-based record-keeping methods and the subsequent paper waste associated with this method of health record-keeping. This contributes to SDG 12 - Responsible Consumption and Production.
• Cost Reduction: We hope to reduce the cost of accessing quality healthcare services by facilitating informed medical diagnoses during emergencies.
• Inclusion and Diversity: At Healthlytic, we hope to build a diverse and inclusive space within our team, the community we serve, and the services we offer - making it accessible to the underserved population. This reflects our commitment to contribute our quota to SDG 10.2 of the United Nations (Reduced Inequalities).

At Healthlytic, our solution is powered by both a web and mobile application. The web application is designed with our end-user in mind; healthcare providers while the mobile application is targeted to the patient's side of the solution. The EHR solution will also include an Artificial Intelligence component - voice transcription software.

This A.I. feature will make our system intuitive by allowing patients to record their appointment sessions with their physicians. The A.I. records and transcribes in real-time and at the end of each session, the A.I. generates and stores a summary of the session on the patient's portal even before the physician is able to document and upload their physician notes onto the patient's portal. Furthermore, we are offering a cloud-based solution using AWS-cloud services which will allow patients to use our solution from anywhere with an internet connection.

Although this is not an entirely new technology, we are applying it to a distinctive location targeted to underserved populations in Nigeria who have over the past two decades been neglected in the healthcare planning and delivery system in place.

Healthlytic is yet to launch, however, studies have shown us that the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of the EHR market in the Middle East and Africa is at 3.5%.

Thus, in year 1, Healthlytic through our EHR mobile application will directly impact 10,000 users (patients) while our web application will impact 30 healthcare centers in Nigeria.

Through community engagement and awareness campaigns, we will sensitize 20 communities to the need and benefits of using an electronic health record.

Thus, in the coming year, Healthlytic will meaningfully impact 35,000 people across Nigeria.

The barriers that Healthlytic is currently facing are;

• A Shortage of Technical Skills: Currently, we do not have enough Software Engineers, Back-end Developers, and Machine Learning Engineers to successfully develop our digital solution to meet the needs of our target users. We need a more technically competent team. 

• Product Development Costs: To successfully design and develop our solution, we need financial capital to hire experienced tech talents as stated above, and purchase cloud storage to help us develop our EHR solution and achieve our impact goals. 
  

• Cultural Barriers: Despite the widespread use of mobile devices and computer systems (laptops, etc.), a good percentage of the population is not enlightened on the many benefits of digital solutions. To solve this, we hope to organize community awareness campaigns to enlighten this population of our target users on the benefits of digital solutions with an emphasis on the use of the EHR solution to improve their health outcomes. Thus, initial adoption may take a while to educate users on Healthlytic’s EHR use.

• Marketing Costs: To reach our intended users and successfully break into the market, a large share of financial capital would go into marketing, advertising, awareness campaigns, and programs. Therefore, the high marketing costs will pose a market entry barrier for our EHR solution.

Healthlytic currently has two groups of partners for community awareness campaigns and training & capacity building:

• Samuel Ioron Foundation: this is a non-profit organization that designs several community development projects targeted to underserved populations. We are leveraging their wide network of communities and community leaders to reach more communities for our community awareness campaigns.
• Infodux Consult Limited: this is an educational firm that offers both educational and professional training to its customers. Healthlytic partners with Infodux to provide professional and digital skills training for existing and new members of the Healthlytic team.

Customer Segments:

1. Hospitals.
2. Clinics.
3. Medical professionals.
4. Patients with chronic diseases.
5. Patients with complex care needs.
6. General patients.

Value Proposition/Type of Intervention:

1. Improved accuracy and completeness of patient records.

2. Increased efficiency of healthcare providers' administrative tasks.

3. Reduced costs of storing patient's records on paper and risk of misplaced records.

4. Enhanced security of patient health information through secure data storage and access control.

5. Improved access to medical records for patients.

6. Enhanced communication between patients and health providers by allowing patients to share their records with multiple providers.

Channels:

1. Websites.

2. Social Media.
3. Sales team.
4. Software platform.
5. Email.
6. Telephone.
7. Press.

1. Free training for health providers.
2. 24/7 customer support.
3. Customer loyalty programs.
4. Customer testimonials.
5. Case studies.
6. Data on user satisfaction and retention.

Key Activities:

1. Cloud storage purchase.
2. Set up & manage the database.
3. Software development.
4. Testing.
5. Customer Service.
6. Marketing.

Key Resources:

1. Cloud Systems.
2. Software.
3. Full-Stack Engineers.
4. Website.
5. Workspace.
6. Internet Connectivity.
7. Work tools.
8. Marketing team.

Key Partners:

1. HMOs/Health Insurers (e.g Zenith Medicare Nigeria).

2. Hospitals & health centers.

3. Nigerian Medical Association.

4. Federal Ministry of Health.

5. Payment Gateways.

6. Angel Investors.

Cost Structure:

1. Software development.
2. Cloud & IT Systems.
3. Help center.
4. Marketing.
5. Employees.
6. Workspace rent.

Revenue Stream:

1. Recurring Monthly Subscription Fee.
2. Strategic Partnership.

There are several financial sustainability pathways available for Healthlytic which we hope to explore both in the short and long term:

1. Subscription-based model: One of the most common financial sustainability paths for Healthlytic is to charge healthcare providers and patients a subscription fee for access to our EHR system. This can be on a monthly or annual basis. The subscription fee can be based on the number of users, the size of the facility, and other factors.

2. Advertising: Healthlytic could also consider generating revenue through advertising. This can be achieved by selling advertising space on the unpaid version of our EHR platform to relevant health-related companies or organizations. This unpaid version includes both the 1-month trial period of the platform and the long-term use of the platform limited access to more sophisticated features of the solution.

3. Strategic Partnership: Another financial sustainability path could be to use the data collected from patients and healthcare providers to generate insights and analytics that can generate revenue for the company through its strategic partnership with pharmaceutical companies, insurers, or government organizations while strengthening the Nigerian healthcare system.

4. Consulting and training services: Healthlytic could also generate revenue through consulting and training services. This can include helping healthcare providers to implement the EHR system and providing training on how to use the system effectively.

5. Government funding: Healthlytic can also consider seeking funding from the government, either through grants or contracts.