Original Title : eDOTS: Revolutionizing Tuberculosis Treatment
Media Format : MIS/Web & Mobile
Website : http://opasha.org
Producer : Operation ASHA
Language : English, Hindi, easy translated into other languages
Location : Delhi, INDIA
Contact : sandeep.ahuja@opasha.org

Operation ASHA eDOTS initiative is enhancing tuberculosis (TB) control by implementing biometric attendance terminals at its treatment centres. Because patients who default on their medicines are likely to develop multi-drug resistant TB (MDR), patient adherence to standard tuberculosis medicines is essential. In response to the rising epidemic, the WHO implemented the DOTS program, which requires patients to travel to TB clinics and take their medicines under the observation of a health worker. eDOTS program requires patients to register their attendance on a fingerprint reader when they take their medicines. At the end of each day, the attendance record from every terminal is sent to the database via text message. On the occasion that a patient misses his or her dose, a notifying text message is sent from the terminal to the responsible health worker and supervisor. Once the SMS is sent, the health worker has 48 hours to deliver TB medicines and acquire the fingerprint of the defaulting patient as proof of the visit. eDOTS focuses health consultation on the patients who need it most, while providing indisputable verification that a patient was physically present for the treatment.

The Jury appreciated the fact that eDOTS initiative is the first to apply biometric attendance monitoring to tuberculosis treatment in the country. It was observed that as on date no other TB control system could provide verifiable evidence to back up its TB statistics. The Jury noted that in that context, innovation, transparency and accountability are the strong pillars of this initiative. The Jury also noted that eDOTS is currently the most reliable method of tracking tuberculosis treatment for slum areas. Usually TB symptoms subside after the first two months of treatment consequently patients often fail to complete the full 6-7 month regimen. It was observed that in response to this common behaviour among ill-informed under-privileged patients, eDOTS digitally tracks patient adherence and ensures that patients are physically present to take their medicines. The Jury appreciated that this initiative, now implemented in all OpASHA South Delhi Centres over an year, would be the most effective in areas with minimal resources and that way the project is doing an yeoman service to the health sector.

Original Title : Amrita Clinical Decision Support System by Newdigm Healthcare
Media Format : Mobile based
Website : http://www.newdigm.com
Producer : Newdigm Healthcare Technologies
Language : English, Tamil, Telugu
Location : Tamil Nadu, INDIA
Contact : sauravdas@newdigm.com

This initiative, started by Newdigm Healthcare Technologies, is a mobile phone based clinical decision-support technology for Village Health Providers (VHP). Due to acute shortage of doctors in rural areas, empowering semi-skilled VHP through this initiative is the most practical solution for delivering healthcare in remote village areas. With this premise a team of doctors from Stanley Medical College (SMC) and a group of engineers from IIT-Madras started working on a decision-support technology for village health workers (VHW). The clinical decision-support technology enables VHW to take better decisions with respect to diagnosis, treatment, referral, monitoring and follow-up of patients’ illness. The Decision-support for VHP is mobile- phone based solution which can be supported by any Java, Android and Blackberry mobile phone. The health-provider needs to be trained only once and unless there is a major overhaul in protocols, they only need to update the version of the decision-support from the remote server.

The Jury appreciated the way the technology has been used in this project, which significantly reduced the pre-requisites for a villager to become a qualified health-provider. This also improved compliance and adherence to medical protocols. It was noted that the mobile phone based decision-support technology in vernacular language helps the village health-worker, in arriving at presumptive diagnosis, treatment plan, filtering cases for referral and follow-up of patients essentially deskilling the job of a VHW. The cost-effective way of investments needed for both technology and human resource, which makes the solution highly scalable, was also appreciated by the Jury.

Original Title : BRAC-mPower mHealth model for Maternal, Neonatal and Child Health
Media Format : Mobile based
Website : www.mpower-social.com
Producer : mPower Social Enterprises Ltd.
Language : Bangla, English
Location : Dhaka, BANGLADESH
Contact : mridul@mpower-health.com

This mobile-based mHealth model for Maternal, Neo-natal and Child Health (MNCH) aims to improve maternal, newborn and child health issues with enhanced efficiency and effectiveness. The components of this model are: a. Patient Management and Care system which is a mobile- based platform used by Community Health Workers (CHWs), to collect household and patient data through a step-by-step decision tree (in Bangla language), eliminating the need for them to decide for themselves which data to collect, when and also what to do with the data. b. Emergency Management system whichis driven centrally by a hotline centre with an easy-to-remember short-code, ensuring singular responsibility for all emergency cases. c. Monitoring and Reporting system due to the instant digitisation of all the data entered using this system. Most managerial functions is done automatically or in a much easier and more resource efficient manner. Key components of this system are: i. View real time reports ii. View performance indicators iii. Validation and cross-checking.

The Jury appreciated that the project started in 2007 in the urban slums of Bangladesh through community based health services and at present about 8,000 trained community health workers (CHWs) are providing maternal, neonatal and child health (MNCH) services at doorstep, by enhancing supportive skilled birth attendance and arranging timely referral of complications to hospitals, for about 90,000 households in Dhaka. The Jury opined that this has been an effective programme for better access to health services for pregnant mothers ensuring survival of mothers, neonates and children in the urban slums of the city of Dhaka.