Onehealth+

OneHealth+ is addressing a critical issue prevalent in Africa and other regions: the lack of robust health financing mechanisms and its profound impact on healthcare accessibility. Currently, 800 million individuals on the continent struggle to set aside funds for their medical needs and lack adequate insurance coverage. This dire situation is underscored by the World Health Organization's findings that 38% of this population will forgo necessary treatment during health crises. Moreover, over 110 million Africans who do seek hospital care annually end up facing catastrophic health expenditures, exacerbating their financial burden and pushing them further into poverty.

The absence of personal means to cover healthcare expenses often places a heavy burden on family members in the diaspora. Notably, a significant portion of financial support for healthcare in Africa comes from relatives and friends residing abroad, contributing more than $9 billion annually. However, the existing remittance process is ill-suited for healthcare purposes. High transaction fees and the common practice of receiving funds in cash create challenges in tracking and ensuring that the money is used for its intended healthcare purpose. Additionally, members of the diaspora face limited visibility into the quality of care being provided to their loved ones back home.

OneHealth+ aims to mitigate these challenges by leveraging existing healthcare facilities and implementing innovative solutions. Our digital health platform connects providers, patients, and payers, streamlining healthcare payments through a paperless and transparent system. It's like having a digital wallet specifically for healthcare expenses. Here's how it works:

Healthpass Purchase: Patients can buy their own healthpass directly through the OneHealth+ platform. This healthpass acts as a ticket for immediate access to healthcare services at partnered clinics without the hassle of lengthy registration processes.

Primary Healthcare Remittance: Friends or family members from anywhere in the world can also purchase healthpasses for their loved ones. It's like sending money specifically for healthcare needs. This feature ensures that financial support for healthcare is efficient and transparent, eliminating delays in care caused by traditional remittance processes.

Community Healthpass Bundles: Employers, governments, and organizations can buy bundles of healthpasses for their communities. This approach provides a flexible and accessible healthcare financing option compared to traditional cash or insurance-based systems.

Blockchain Technology: OneHealth+ leverages blockchain technology to ensure transparency, security, and efficiency in healthcare payments. Blockchain keeps a secure and tamper-proof record of all transactions, providing peace of mind for both patients and healthcare providers.

Mutual Scheme Health Insurance: OneHealth+ operates as a mutual scheme health insurance system, where people other than the patient can purchase "coverage" for primary health needs. Unlike traditional insurance, there's no distinction between covered or uncovered services, making it easier for individuals to access care when they need it.

By facilitating seamless healthcare payments and bridging the gap between patients, providers, and payers, OneHealth+ seeks to improve healthcare accessibility and quality for millions of individuals in Africa and beyond. Our platform empowers patients to receive timely and quality care while alleviating the financial burdens that often accompany healthcare expenses. Ultimately, OneHealth+ is committed to creating a healthcare ecosystem where everyone can access the care they need to lead healthy and fulfilling lives regardless of their financial circumstances.

Our solution is primarily aimed at three key target populations: middle-to-upper-class individuals residing in emerging economies, individuals living in the diaspora with family members in these regions, and established organizations, employers, and governments supporting populations in areas where the healthcare system is not adequately equipped to handle the dual burden of acute and chronic diseases.

Currently, these target populations face significant challenges in accessing affordable, convenient, and high-quality healthcare services. In emerging economies, the healthcare infrastructure is often underdeveloped, resulting in limited access to primary care facilities and trained healthcare professionals. Additionally, individuals living in the diaspora struggle with the inefficiencies of traditional remittance processes, which often involve high transaction fees and lack transparency regarding the use of funds for healthcare purposes.

Our solution directly addresses these needs by leveraging existing healthcare facilities and introducing innovative payment methods powered by blockchain technology. Middle-to-upper-class individuals in emerging economies will benefit from improved access to primary care services, including both in-person and virtual consultations with trained healthcare professionals. Our streamlined payment system will provide a more efficient and direct-to-provider option for healthcare payments, reducing transaction costs and ensuring transparency in financial transactions.

Moreover, individuals living in the diaspora will experience greater ease in supporting their family members' healthcare needs back home. Our platform offers a secure and transparent means of sending funds specifically for healthcare purposes, eliminating the uncertainty and inefficiencies associated with traditional remittance methods.

Furthermore, by targeting established organizations, employers, and governments, our solution generates revenue that enables us to support mobile medical clinic outreach. Through initiatives like mobile health vans, we provide free healthcare services to underserved populations in rural communities, ensuring that healthcare access is equitable and inclusive for all individuals, regardless of their socioeconomic status or geographic location.

In essence, our solution aims to directly and meaningfully improve the lives of individuals, families, communities, and populations by addressing the existing gaps in healthcare access, affordability, and quality in emerging economies. By leveraging technology and innovative payment methods, we strive to create a more equitable and accessible healthcare ecosystem for all.

Our team is deeply rooted in the communities we aim to serve, providing us with a unique understanding of their needs and challenges. As founders born and raised in Ghana, we have firsthand experience navigating the limitations of basic healthcare access in economically developing countries. Our personal experiences fuel our passion and drive to make a tangible difference in addressing these challenges.

With over a decade of collective experience in healthcare administration, digital health, biomedical research, and business development, we possess the expertise necessary to develop and implement our proposed primary care solution. Our team's diverse skill set allows us to approach the problem from multiple angles and develop comprehensive solutions that address the complex needs of our target population.

In addition to our professional backgrounds, we are actively engaged in community outreach efforts. We currently operate a mobile medical clinic van in collaboration with the OKB Hope Foundation, delivering care to over 4000 patients in 30+ communities in Ghana. Through this initiative, we have also trained over 20 community members as community health volunteers, empowering them to play a role in improving healthcare access in their communities.

Our commitment to community engagement extends beyond service delivery. We actively seek input and feedback from patients and community members to inform the design and implementation of our solution. Informal surveys conducted during our mobile medical van visits provide valuable insights into the needs and preferences of our target population. Additionally, we engage in ongoing dialogue with patients and community members to gather feedback on improving our services.

Furthermore, our team benefits from the guidance of three advisors who are physician leaders at one of Ghana's premier hospitals. Their expertise and insights are invaluable in shaping our approach to developing and rolling out our digital primary healthcare center.

As we continue to refine our solution, we are implementing more formalized surveys and piloting small changes, such as appointment booking, to better understand patient preferences and care delivery workflows in Ghana. Our design and implementation processes are meaningfully guided by the input, ideas, and agendas of the communities we serve. We remain committed to collecting data and feedback to ensure that our solution remains responsive to the evolving needs of the community and continues to make a meaningful impact on healthcare access and delivery.

So far, we have successfully built the OneHealth+ platform and initiated pilot testing with three medical centers and five diagnostic centers. This pilot phase allows us to assess the platform's functionality, usability, and effectiveness in real-world settings. By partnering with these healthcare facilities, we aim to gather valuable feedback from both healthcare providers and patients to refine and improve our platform.

In addition to our pilot testing, we have achieved significant milestones in terms of recognition and support. We recently got accepted into the Stena X fintech studio accelerator program, which provides us with the opportunity to further develop and iterate our products with the guidance and support of industry experts and mentors.

Furthermore, we have successfully completed both the Mass Challenge accelerator and the John D'Silva incubator programs, which have equipped us with valuable resources, mentorship, and networking opportunities to accelerate our growth and impact. Additionally, we were selected to be part of the 2023 black ambition semifinalist, further validating the potential of our solution to make a meaningful difference in healthcare access and financing.

Overall, our accomplishments thus far demonstrate our dedication to building a robust and impactful solution to address the challenges of healthcare access and financing in emerging economies. Through our pilot testing and participation in accelerator programs, we are committed to refining and scaling our platform to serve even more customers and beneficiaries in the future.

Solve's support will be instrumental in overcoming various barriers we face as we strive to scale and expand the impact of our solution. Specifically, we hope Solve can assist us in the following areas:

Technical and Legal Resources: Solve can provide us with technical expertise and legal guidance to enhance the scalability and impact of our solution. By leveraging Solve's network of experts, we can address technical challenges and ensure compliance with legal regulations as we expand into new markets.

Network of Experts and Mentors: Access to Solve's network of experts and mentors will be invaluable in refining our solution and navigating cultural barriers in diverse markets. By tapping into Solve's vast resources, we can receive valuable feedback and insights to optimize our approach and tailor it to the specific needs of each community we serve.

Expansion to New Markets: While our solution initially targets Ghana, we recognize the potential for broader impact in other emerging economies globally. Solve can help us identify opportunities in markets such as Latin America, Asia, and parts of Europe, where different aspects of the OneHealth+ solution could address similar healthcare challenges.

Fundraising and Partnership Opportunities: Solve can support us in fundraising efforts by connecting us with potential investors and partners who share our vision of providing affordable and accessible healthcare to underserved communities. By leveraging Solve's platform, we can access a broader pool of resources and opportunities to fuel our growth and expansion.

Overall, we believe that Solve provides us with the necessary support and resources to further incubate, experiment, build, and achieve our goals. With Solve's assistance, we are confident in our ability to overcome barriers and make a meaningful impact on healthcare access and affordability in emerging economies around the world.

Our solution offers a novel approach to addressing healthcare payment challenges through our blockchain-based payment system. By leveraging blockchain technology, we provide a transparent, secure, and efficient option for healthcare payments, eliminating issues commonly associated with traditional payment methods such as high transaction fees, delays, and lack of transparency.

This innovative payment solution has the potential to catalyze broader positive impacts in the global south by inspiring other healthcare providers to explore and transition towards bundled and value-based healthcare financing systems. By demonstrating the effectiveness and benefits of our approach, we can encourage industry-wide adoption of similar payment models, leading to improved healthcare access, affordability, and quality for millions of individuals in emerging economies.

Moreover, our solution has the capability to change the market dynamics by introducing new opportunities for data collection and analysis. Through the purchase and use of health passes by patients, healthcare providers can gather valuable insights into the volumes and types of care utilized by patients. This data can inform strategic decision-making, resource allocation, and planning for supply chain disruptions, especially crucial in the face of global supply chain disturbances. By harnessing data-driven insights, providers can optimize their operations and enhance the overall efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare delivery.

In summary, our solution offers a transformative approach to healthcare payment, catalyzing broader positive impacts by inspiring industry-wide adoption of bundled and value-based financing models and facilitating data-driven decision-making to improve healthcare access and delivery in emerging economies.

Our theory of change centers around utilizing Lewin's Three-stage Change Model to address the problem of underutilization of primary care in emerging economies. We hypothesize that by implementing this model, we can effectively unfreeze current behaviors, change them toward utilizing continuous primary care, and then refreeze these new behaviors to sustain the use of primary care over time.

Our approach is grounded in the belief that providing access to high-quality, low-cost primary care will lead to better health outcomes and a reduction in the use of high-cost care for preventable illnesses. By leveraging Lewin's model, we aim to create a sustainable shift in behavior towards utilizing primary care as the first line of defense for health concerns, rather than seeking care only when an illness is severe.

To measure the success of our theory of change, we will collect data on several key metrics, including the number of patients receiving care, the communities served, the percentage of individuals receiving free healthcare versus those who pay, and changes in physiologic markers such as blood pressure and diabetic markers. These metrics will help us evaluate the impact of our solution on health outcomes and overall quality of life for our target population.

By focusing on these metrics, our outputs will lead to longer-term outcomes, including improved health outcomes for individuals in rural communities, better management of chronic diseases, and overall improved health and well-being for underserved populations. Through our theory of change, we aim to create a lasting impact on healthcare access and delivery in emerging economies, ultimately improving the lives of millions of individuals around the world.

Our impact goals are focused on creating tangible improvements in healthcare access, quality, and outcomes for underserved populations in emerging economies. We aim to measure our progress through the following indicators:

Number of patients receiving care from our partnered health centers: This indicator reflects the reach and accessibility of our healthcare services to individuals in need.

Number of people receiving care in rural communities: We prioritize reaching individuals in rural areas where healthcare access may be limited, thus ensuring equitable distribution of services.

Number of individuals with chronic diseases being managed: By effectively managing chronic conditions, we aim to improve long-term health outcomes and quality of life for affected individuals.

Change in physiological markers such as blood pressure and diabetic markers: Improvements in physiological markers indicate better disease management and overall health status among our target population.

Number of communities where the organization operates: Expansion into new communities demonstrates the scalability and effectiveness of our solution in reaching diverse populations.

Percentage of individuals receiving free healthcare versus those who pay for care: Monitoring this percentage allows us to assess the accessibility and affordability of our services, ensuring that financial barriers do not hinder healthcare access.

Revenue: While financial sustainability is important, our goal is to prioritize impact over profit. Revenue generation enables us to continue providing quality care and expanding our reach to more communities.

Inventory comparison with outstanding health passes and number of health passes redeemed: This indicator helps us track the utilization of health passes, ensuring that individuals are accessing the care they need and that our resources are effectively allocated.

By monitoring these indicators, we can evaluate our progress towards our impact goals and make data-driven decisions to optimize our efforts. Ultimately, our aim is to create meaningful and transformational improvements in healthcare access and outcomes for underserved populations in emerging economies.

Our solution, OneHealth+, leverages modern technology, specifically blockchain, to address the challenge of healthcare access and financing in emerging economies. By utilizing blockchain technology, we provide a transparent, secure, and efficient platform for healthcare payments, eliminating issues commonly associated with traditional payment methods. This technology ensures the integrity and transparency of transactions, safeguarding patient data and financial transactions.

Additionally, our platform incorporates other modern technologies such as mobile applications and virtual consultations to enhance accessibility and convenience for patients. Through our mobile app, patients can easily purchase health passes, schedule appointments, and access healthcare services remotely, reducing barriers to care for individuals in remote or underserved areas.

Furthermore, our solution combines modern technology with traditional knowledge systems by integrating community-based healthcare models and leveraging the expertise of local healthcare providers. We collaborate with community health volunteers and traditional healers to ensure culturally sensitive and holistic care delivery, respecting and incorporating ancestral knowledge into our healthcare practices.

By harnessing the power of modern technology alongside traditional knowledge systems, OneHealth+ seeks to benefit both people and the planet. Through improved healthcare access and financing, we aim to enhance health outcomes, reduce healthcare disparities, and promote overall well-being for individuals in emerging economies. Additionally, by incorporating sustainable practices and respecting local customs and traditions, we strive to promote environmental sustainability and cultural preservation within the communities we serve.

Full-time staff: 2, Part-time staff: 3

My team and I have been working on the solution for two years.

We are proud to have a diverse leadership team at our organization, reflecting our commitment to equity and inclusion. Our founders are people of color who were born and partly raised in Ghana, bringing firsthand experience and cultural insight to our work. Additionally, our board of advisors comprises individuals from diverse backgrounds in both profession and heritage, including Ghana, Italy, and the United States.

Within our leadership team, we prioritize gender diversity, with 40% of our team being women. However, we recognize that diversity encompasses more than gender and are committed to building a team that is representative of the communities we serve.

We believe that equity is essential for ensuring access to opportunity and advancement for all team members. To foster a culture of inclusion, we have implemented various actions, including:

1. Actively seeking out and recruiting diverse candidates: We prioritize diversity in our recruitment efforts to ensure that our team reflects the rich tapestry of backgrounds and perspectives present in our communities.

2. Partnering with local Ghanaian healthcare providers to support underrepresented communities: By collaborating with local partners, we gain insights into the unique needs of underrepresented communities and tailor our solutions to address these needs effectively.

3. Providing ongoing diversity, equity, and inclusion training: We offer regular training sessions to our staff members to enhance awareness and understanding of diversity, equity, and inclusion issues and foster an inclusive workplace culture.

4. Soliciting feedback from our team and stakeholders: We actively seek input from our team members and stakeholders to assess the effectiveness of our diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and identify areas for improvement.

5. Inclusion of local Ghanaian physicians on our board of advisors: Our board includes local Ghanaian physicians from premier hospitals, ensuring that our work is culturally sensitive and responsive to the needs of the communities we serve.

Through these actions, we are committed to creating a workplace where all team members are welcomed, respected, supported, and valued, and where diversity and inclusion are celebrated as strengths that drive innovation and impact.

Our business model revolves around providing value to different segments of the population we serve through various products and services:

Healthcare Packages: We offer a range of healthcare packages tailored to the needs of our customers, providing them with access to essential medical services, consultations, diagnostics, and treatments. These packages are designed to cater to different levels of care and affordability, ensuring that individuals can choose the option that best meets their needs and budget.
Proprietary Payment Platform: Our proprietary payment platform streamlines the process of accessing healthcare services by allowing individuals to purchase health passes. These passes provide immediate access to care at our partnered healthcare facilities. We charge a 3% transaction fee for every health pass purchase and use, generating revenue to sustain our business operations and fund our non-profit initiatives.

Mobile Medical Clinic Vans: As part of our commitment to serving underprivileged communities, we operate mobile medical clinic vans that provide free healthcare services to patients in rural areas. These clinics offer essential medical care, screenings, and treatments to individuals who may otherwise lack access to healthcare services. The revenue generated from healthcare packages sold to middle and upper-class individuals subsidizes the costs of operating these mobile clinics, allowing us to reach underserved populations and address healthcare disparities.

Our products and services address the diverse healthcare needs of our customers and beneficiaries by providing accessible, affordable, and high-quality care. Whether individuals require routine check-ups, specialized treatments, or emergency medical attention, our business model ensures that everyone has access to the healthcare services they need. Through our commitment to sustainability and social responsibility, we strive to make a positive impact on the health and well-being of communities, both locally and globally.

We plan to achieve financial sustainability through a diversified approach to revenue generation, combining various streams to cover our expected expenses:

Clinical Care Packages: We offer healthcare packages tailored to the needs of middle and upper-class Ghanaians, generating revenue through the sale of these packages. These packages provide access to essential medical services, consultations, diagnostics, and treatments, ensuring that individuals receive high-quality care while contributing to our financial sustainability.

Proprietary Payment Platform: Our proprietary payment platform charges a 3% transaction fee for every health pass purchase, providing us with an additional revenue stream. This fee contributes to our overall revenue while streamlining the process of accessing healthcare services for our customers.
Investment Income: Any proceeds generated from health pass transactions beyond operational expenses will be invested in short-term investments. These investments aim to generate additional revenue in the long term, contributing to our financial stability and growth.

Data Repositories and Clinical Trials: In the longer term, we plan to monetize our de-identified data repositories by selling access to researchers and pharmaceutical companies. Additionally, we aim to connect our patient populations with clinical trials, providing a potential means for additional revenue while facilitating the development of therapies effective for populations in emerging markets.

By diversifying our revenue streams and investing in sustainable practices, we aim to achieve financial sustainability while continuing to provide high-quality healthcare to our patient populations. This approach allows us to cover our expected expenses while also driving innovation and advancing healthcare outcomes for communities in emerging economies.