Taking digital health from aspiration to action in Low and Middle Income Contexts (LMICs)
Digital health is a rapidly expanding area that has been catalysed by the spread of COVID-19. The opportunity to move the clinical consultations of potentially infectious patients online to avoid health structures with vulnerable patients is an obvious potential advantage. There is also a wider potential to alleviate pressure on the health system as a whole by assisting other disease areas with digital solutions.
Digital health encompasses a range of solutions offering an incredibly broad range of technology options that can be used to target many types of populations, disease areas, and points along the patient pathway. However, with such a broad spectrum available, navigating this ecosystem, knowing what is appropriate, and how to effectively implement a digital health tool is a daunting task. That’s why, at Outsight, we’ve put together a team of experts who can help you at any stage in your digital health journey: from the initial needs assessment; to the technology landscaping; to assisting the development and implementation.
Examples of digital health in action
Digital health is here to stay. There is an ever growing evidence base for the spectrum of digital health interventions across the patient pathway for a variety of therapeutic areas and indicatications. As the world responds to COVID-19 and attempts to maintain the already stretched services in LMICs, digital means offer a way to expand health access and efficacy.
Some applications of digital health demonstrating notable efficacy and potential include:
Digitally enabled contact tracing
Telemedicine consultations
Remote patient monitoring
AI assisted epidemiology
Communication tools (e.g. combatting mis/disinformation)
Community Health Worker support applications
In advance of the COVID-19 response, digital health had been making notable headway, achieving its second highest year of venture capital investment last year with a $7.5 Billion (£5.7 Billion) attributed to startups in the space. However to date much of the focus has been on commercializing and scientifically validating digital health interventions in high income contexts. In Low and Middle Income Contexts (LMICS) Ministries of Health are starting to realise the need and timely potential of digital health offerings to extend the reach of their essential healthcare services. Collaboration and partnership will inevitably be essential for stakeholders to establish a shared vision and robust understanding of how these interventions may meaningfully improve health outcomes, and demonstrate their impact.
At Outsight we recognise that the pace of digital health developments is often overwhelming for organisations that have not previously navigated the space: understanding the difference between digital health and digital therapeutics (DTx); navigating what ‘good’ should look like in terms of a solution’s evidence and weighing up the risk of implementation versus digital health inaction. Our Digital Health team can help you navigate the landscape, identify evidence-based solutions, connect with relevant experts for added understanding and execute on a well informed digital health strategy.
Putting game-changing technologies to work
Outsight International has developed a framework that enables organisations at various stages of digital health engagement. Whether your team is looking to enter into this space for the first time or you are looking to optimize a pre-existing digital health strategy, our team and framework can be adapted to your needs:
The Outsight approach will help you to:
Understand the real-world challenges associated with specific healthcare systems and opportunities offered by new technologies;
Design complete end-to-end strategies for developing an enabling digital health ecosystem;
Launch — plan a phased approach for creating the on-the-ground systems needed for practical implementation and impact.
Specific services
Needs assessments — In-depth mapping of the dynamic systems that underpin how efficient a health organisation is, and where its pain-points are. This can be holistic at a system level or targeted to a specific patient population or disease area.
Solution landscaping — A rapid overview and scoping of what digital tools and solutions are available, their pros and cons, and appropriateness to particular health systems or disease areas.
Stakeholder and community engagement — A participatory process for identifying all major stakeholders as well as their experience and needs.
Developing improved patient journeys — Producing service blueprints of the targeted patient experiences in a collaborative way with stakeholders and community engagement.
Defining business / operating models — Assessing the possible options to ensure solutions become self-sustaining through market analyses and strategic understanding.
Managing or assisting with the adaption, setup and implementation of digital tools — Ensuring that tools meet the needs requirements of their specific contexts and target users.
On-the-ground training and operations — Extensive development and humanitarian experience means the Outsight team can quickly adapt to the operational realities of field implementations.
Monitoring and evaluation frameworks — Knowing how to monitor the effectiveness and impact of new solutions is essential. That’s why M&E form an integral part of all our digital health projects.
