Digital Health
- Transitioning to Digital Systems: The Role of World Health Organization’s Digital Adaptation Kits in Operationalizing Recommendations and Interoperability Standards
The World Health Organization (WHO) digital adaptation kits distill WHO guidance into a standardized format that can be more easily incorporated into digital systems and facilitate communication between the health workforce and technologists to enable a shared understanding of the underlying content.
- Development of an Innovative Digital Data Collection System for Routine Mental Health Care Delivery in Rural Haiti
Mental health information systems in low-resource settings are scarce worldwide. Data collection was accurate, yet sustainable staffing was a challenge when using task-shared clinical providers for data collection in health centers in rural Haiti. Integrating mental health data collection within existing data collection systems would help close this key gap.
- Using mHealth to Improve Timeliness and Quality of Maternal and Newborn Health in the Primary Health Care System in Ethiopia
The use of mobile health (mHealth) in Ethiopia’s primary health care system offers a potential solution to improve timeliness and quality for maternal and newborn health care services. It is user-friendly and fosters communication between health care workers and health extension workers to provide quality services across the pregnancy continuum of care.
- An International Virtual Classroom: The Emergency Department Experience at Weill Cornell Medicine and Weill Bugando Medical Center in Tanzania
We created a sustainable, bidirectional partnership using telecommunication technology to enhance emergency medicine education collaboration. Telemedicine is a practical and innovative methodology to expand training in emergency medicine and establish bidirectional partnerships between academic departments in high-income and low- and middle-income countries.
- Unintended Consequences of mHealth Interactive Voice Messages Promoting Contraceptive Use After Menstrual Regulation in Bangladesh: Intimate Partner Violence Results From a Randomized Controlled Trial
Automated interactive voice messages about post-menstrual regulation contraception delivered to women in Bangladesh via mobile phone were associated with increased reports of intimate partner violence. This finding highlights the importance of taking steps to minimize risk when delivering phone messages on sensitive topics and the need for assessing violence in such situations.
- Getting to the First 90: Incentivized Peer Mobilizers Promote HIV Testing Services to Men Who Have Sex With Men Using Social Media in Mumbai, India
This peer mobilization pilot for HIV and syphilis testing used messaging on gay dating sites, clinic referrals, and peer recruitment to reach men who have sex with men in Mumbai. In 6 months, the pilot reached a relatively modest 247 individuals, 244 of whom had never tested for HIV. Challenges included low recruitment and loss to follow-up for posttest counseling and treatment initiation for individuals with HIV.
- Cell Phone Counseling Improves Retention of Mothers With HIV Infection in Care and Infant HIV Testing in Kisumu, Kenya: A Randomized Controlled Study
Tailored, one-on-one counseling delivered via cell phone was very effective in retaining mothers with HIV in care and in promoting infant HIV testing and antenatal and postnatal care attendance. The highest risk of loss to follow-up among women with HIV accessing PMTCT services was prior to delivery and then after infant HIV testing at 6 weeks. Challenges include continued limited access to cell phones, difficulty with reaching participants on the phone, and poor adherence to antiretroviral therapy for a substantial percentage of the population.
- Efficacy of a Digital Health Tool on Contraceptive Ideation and Use in Nigeria: Results of a Cluster-Randomized Control Trial
A mobile digital health tool piloted in Kaduna City, Nigeria, was efficacious in promoting positive contraceptive attitudes and encouraging women to adopt a modern contraceptive method, thus showing potential for reducing unmet need in Nigeria.
- Unpacking the “Black Box”: How an SMS-Based Continuing Medical Education Intervention Improved Medical Knowledge Among HIV Clinicians in Vietnam
Daily SMS quizzes sent to medical practitioners seem to act as a stimulus for further self-study when paired with access to additional readings and online courses, improving medical knowledge as a result.
- mLearning in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: A Mixed-Methods Feasibility and Pilot Cluster Randomized Trial Using the Safe Delivery App
Health worker knowledge and self-confidence in basic emergency obstetric and newborn care (BEmONC) increased significantly 3 months after introduction of the Safe Delivery App in intervention facilities compared with controls.