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| Pic:Courtesy of innovationsformnch.org |
The situation seems to be a more impossible medical predicament for those with serious illnesses requiring specialist radiology services and there are many such complex illnesses as the country has a huge disease burden.
The paradox is that there are less than a handful of radiologists like Dr Kampondeni to combat the situation.
Save for mobile health initiatives such as Moyo Wanga, it would most certainly be a death sentence for the many with complex illnesses in Malawi.
Dr Sam Kampondeni of Moyo Wanga Private Clinic and one of Malawi’s two radiologists currently practicing in the country, started the Mobile Health Initiative to bridge this oceanic gap in the delivery of health care services but also in creating awareness through health education.
With any basic or feature mobile phone connected to any one of Malawi’s major mobile phone companies, TNM or Airtel a patient or client can simply send an SMS and consult Dr Kampondeni via the mobile phone in either Chichewa or English at a very minimal cost. The Initiative looks promising judging by a surging mobile phone penetration where over 34 % of the 15.9 million people in Malawi use cell phones.
The partnership between the mobile phone companies and Moyo Wanga Private Clinic is helping to save thousands of lives through easy access to otherwise hard-to-access medical expertise. At the same it is cutting costs of travel as well as physical consultation.
During the wake of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in 2014, Moyo Wanga conducted a nationwide Ebola health education campaign that became viral. People rapidly spread the Ebola awareness messages by forwarding the SMSs to friends, family and neighbours at a fraction of the time and money what it would have cost government or indeed development partners to reach the most of Malawi.
I met Dr Kampondeni during IST-Africa 2015 where he explained more on this wonder Mhealth Innitiative.
The radiologist thoroughly explained that the initiatives works by enabling clients to follow easy steps on their mobile phone to send their inquiry which he responds by providing his expert opinion based on what the patient explains and guiding the patient on future action through a text message.
“ The mobile SMS is permanent and can be read many times and can be forwarded with no internet at all. More people are helped just reading the SMSs and do not even come to physically consult,” said Dr Kampondeni.
The Moyo Wanga mobile initiative is breaking through Malawi’s deadly culture of silence, shame and fear of discrimination that has killed many Malawians who have opted not to seek help or indeed withhold some useful information to the doctors at the hospitals.
Apart from patients, doctors and clinicians too are able to send their SMS’s and consult Dr Kampondeni as they deliver medical care. Moyo Wanga is a major boost at the point of caring for patients, again reducing the time and money that it would take for the highly demanded for Dr to travel to all the different referral hospitals that require his medical expertise.
“ With Moyo Wanga people are more open as it is semi-anonymous. Even the people I go to church with can freely consult me via SMS,” says Dr Kampondeni.
Dr Kampondeni is quick to call for partnerships to scale out this wonder initiative and to leverage on Malawi’s bursting mobile phone penetration to solve the health country’s health challenges. He admits that he cannot serve the millions of Malawians alone even with the Mhealth Initiative.
According to Dr Kampondeni, there is need for technical as well as financial support to bring on a few more medical professionals who can collaboratively assist in responding to patient queries.
In the wake of the recently introduced 10% tax on mobile SMS and Internet in Malawi, it seems that this and other promising Mhealth initiative in the country have another uphill battle to overcome before the country start to leverage on emerging ICT4D.
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