Digital health technology

WHO / Blink Media - Bart Verweij, WHO / Alison Brunier, WHO / Aphaluck Bhatiasevi
At New Sokkham Temple in Vientiane, Dr Leutmany connects with the community to share COVID-19 prevention messages / eDEWS software being used on mobile device / Anthropological studies conducted in Monrovia for an effective intervention against Ebola.

Overview

Digital health solutions are needed to prevent, detect and respond to epidemics and pandemics and to promote health and well-being with the aim to achieve the health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Digital health technologies have different functions and can be used as solutions in the following five areas:

Digital health technology & research

Research on and evaluation of digital health outcomes and impact are essential to support its safe implementation, to establish and promote accountability and to justify the financial investment. The agenda should also address the need to stimulate the development and testing of technologies, methods and infrastructures that overcome. obstacles to the application of digital health to health priorities. This agenda is closely linked to capacity-building of research teams and the improvement and sharing of methods and data analytics.

Although randomized controlled trials can provide information on the effectiveness of digital health tools, such trials do not assess the reach of e-health in vulnerable groups or assess whether digital health solutions can be scaled up outside of a study environment. Implementation research on digital health solutions is necessary to generate evidence on challenges using digital health technology in a given context such as (see table at right).

Our work

TDR is supporting countries to conduct Implementation research that can inform the use of digital health technologies in specific contexts and to strengthen country capacity for conducting such research projects.

Areas of work

Development of an online toolkit (IR4DTB) to evaluate the implementation and scale-up of digital innovations across the TB continuum of care.
Development of a research toolkit to support the effective use of computer-aided detection (CAD) software for TB detection by calibrating CAD score thresholds and other parameters.
Support for the Evaluation of the 99DOTS tool for patient TB treatment adherence (Burkina Faso) - ADP.
Multi-country survey on TB program challenges that could be improved by a digital solution, inventory of digital tools in use, and research needs faced by national malaria elimination programs.
Support West and Central Africa network for operational research on barriers to introduction of digital health tools (ADP).
Development of a DHIS2 package to increase the sensitivity of electronic TTB surveillance systems to detect and track disruptions to TB services in the context of a public health emergency.

Multi-country survey on malaria program challenges that could be improved by a digital solution, inventory of digital tools in use, and research needs faced by national malaria elimination programs.

Evaluation of Global Birth Defect App for surveillance & research on congenital anomalies related to Zika and other infectious disease (Burkina Faso)

Support for the Evaluation of the Med Safety App for reporting of adverse drug reaction (Ghana, Uganda, Burkina Faso) - ADP.
Support for the Evaluation of a USSD-based system for reporting of adverse drug reaction (Malawi) - ADP.
Support for development of an interactive e-learning platform for vaccine safety monitoring in the context of COVID-19 vaccines (Morocco WHO Collaborating Center for Pharmacovigilance) - ADP.

Fact sheet