CAMBODIA: Using text messaging as weapon in malaria war
Irin News
“Cambodian efforts to contain the spread of malaria have been strengthened by a pilot project using text messaging and web-based technology.
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Malaria
Phone Messages Improve Care, Study Finds
Donald G. McNeil Jr., The New York Times
“Using cellphones to broadcast text messages reminding health workers in Kenya how to treat children’s malaria increased the number of cases handled correctly, a new study has found.
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The effect of mobile phone text-message reminders on Kenyan health workers’ adherence to malaria treatment guidelines: a cluster randomised trial
Zurovac D et al, The Lancet, 378(9793)
Background
Health workers’ malaria case-management practices often differ from national guidelines. We assessed whether text-message reminders sent to health workers’ mobile phones could improve and maintain their adherence to treatment guidelines for outpatient paediatric malaria in Kenya.
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Use of an innovative, affordable, and open-source short message service-based tool to monitor malaria in remote areas of Uganda
Asiimwe C et al, The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, 85(1)
Quality health management requires timely and accurate data, and paper-based reporting does not fill this role adequately. The introduction of malaria rapid diagnostic tests and the availability of wireless communications present an opportunity to open direct data transmission and feedback between peripheral health workers and central managers. In November 2009, the Uganda Ministry of Health deployed a short message service-based reporting system in two districts. At a set-up cost of $100/health facility, local technician support of $ 400 per month, and a cost of $0.53/week/clinic, the SMS reporting system was started at more than 140 clinics.
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Imagine This! A phone app to diagnose malaria
Bill Crounse, Healthblog
“This week on Microsoft Health Tech Today we report on some amazing work by graduate students at UC Davis. Wilson To and his colleagues have come up with a smartphone app that helps medical workers in the field diagnose malaria. And, this isn’t the first time on our show that we’ve profiled these brilliant young scientists and engineers.
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Bill Gates Wants to Fight Malaria, Zap Mosquitoes, Monitor Brain Injuries
Margaret Rock, Mobiledia
“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has funded a range of projects that use mobile technology to combat health crises, such as diagnosing malaria, targeting insect-borne illness and monitoring brain injuries in infants.
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Tanzania rolls-out “SMS for Life” as country heightens war against Malaria
Henry Neondo, ASNS News
“A public-private initiative in the United Republic of Tanzania has announced the nationwide roll-out of a unique malaria treatment access initiative. The roll-out of “SMS for Life”, across the country follows a successful pilot project where mobile and electronic mapping technology was used to track the stock levels of anti-malarial drugs at health facilities to manage supplies of these essential treatments.
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Students use mobile to fight malaria, help vision-impaired
Neil Versel, mobihealthnews
“Mobile healthcare is on a roll, and you can partially thank the next generation.
Health- and healthcare-related projects took the top four spots in the U.S. finals of the Imagine Cup, an annual student technology competition sponsored by Microsoft.
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The ‘killer app’ that could help save lives
Matthew Knight, CNN
“Killer apps,” so the technological jargon goes, can transform the fortunes of businesses while improving the lives of the people that use them. But very few can claim to improve the worldwide provision of healthcare.
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Get diagnosed by SMS
Kevin Shalvey, Times' Live
“Imagine you’re a two-day trip away from the nearest doctor and are starting to experience flu-like symptoms, but you’re unsure if it’s malaria, swine flu or merely a common cold.
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HP powers SMS-enabled pill authentication
Brian Dolan, mobihealthnews
“HP has inked a deal with mPedigree, which offers a text message based service that helps users check the authenticity of their medications. The technology has been piloted in Ghana and Nigeria. With hosting and security provided by HP, mPedigree will offer the service to patients taking a range of medications manufactured by May & Baker Nigeria and KAMA Group of Ghana.
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Africans text message to check if drugs are real
Maria Cheng, AP News
“For Africans wondering whether the malaria drugs they’ve bought are real, there may soon be a quick way of finding out: sending a text message.
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SMS for Life results have Tanzania dreaming silicon dreams
Dana Blankenhorn, ZDNet Healthcare
“The SMS for Life program to combat malaria was launched with great fanfare in December by IBM, Vodafone and Novartis.
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Smartphones help collect data on malaria cases in remote Uganda
Todd R. Weiss, Computerworld
“When a malaria research project in Uganda was expanded into a full-fledged malaria case-tracking effort across the country in 2006, health officials saw the move as a great opportunity to save lives. After all, malaria is the number one cause of death in Uganda, and occurs throughout 95% of the country, according to one of the research project’s coordinators.
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Far From a Lab? Turn a Cellphone Into a Microscope
Anne Eisenberg, The New York Times
“Microscopes are invaluable tools to identify blood and other cells when screening for diseases like anemia, tuberculosis and malaria. But they are also bulky and expensive.
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Mobile phone becomes low-cost medical microscope
Steve Bush, Electronics Weekly
“Californian scientist have used a phone as the basis of a low-cost medical microscope for the developing world, with built-in image analysis.
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Could u txt me ur blood sample?
Colin Barras, New Scientists
“In the developed world, we take camera phones for granted as ways to record our lives – but in poorer countries they could be used to save lives, say bioengineers. The US team has designed a portable microscope that straps to a camera phone and can be used to diagnose potentially fatal diseases in blood and sputum samples.
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Researchers turn cell phones into fluorescent microscopes
Science Blog
“Berkeley – Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, are proving that a camera phone can capture far more than photos of people or pets at play. They have now developed a cell phone microscope, or CellScope, that not only takes color images of malaria parasites, but of tuberculosis bacteria labeled with fluorescent markers.
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New FP7 eHealth Project – MEDNet
“MEDNet Project will develop a medical network that addresses the problems of providing health care from a distance. The medical network will be supported by expert physician located in urban cities of Latin America. The medical applications will be vary from gynaecology, paediatric, cardiology to typical infectious diseases for the region such as malaria and tuberculosis.”
Article
eHealthNew.eu, 21 April 2008
Web guru targets malaria with social network site
“Tom Hadfield set up Soccer.net in his bedroom before selling it to U.S. sports network ESPN, but now hopes the power of sites such as Facebook can curb a disease that kills an estimated one million people a year, many of them in Africa.”
Article
John Joseph, Reuters, 21 April 2008
