[Re: https://www.hifa.org/dgroups-rss/mhealth-innovate-73-developing-guidance... ]
Hello All, I am contributing to this discussion late, even though I have been following the very informative posts. I want to comment on Neil's lates 3 questions:
Neil, you asked,: 'What percentage of employers of healthprofessionals in different countries actually have a policy on mobile phoneuse? We would be very interested to know, especially from health professionals and facility managers: are you aware of a written policy in your workplace?'
My comment: we enquired about the situation in Nigeria, but found no official policy from Government or private employers. We came across the following comment in one article: ‘----- we found that mConsulting is likely to improve accessibility tohealthcare. But it was introduced into Nigeria without a policy and regulatory framework to assure quality.’ (https://theconversation.com/mobile-technology-can-improve-access-to-heal...). As a result, wecannot contribute to the 2nd and 3rd questions.
It would seem that as with many other innovations in the country, the innovators are ahead of policy makers, with the users of the innovation, in this case healthcare providers and patients at the mercy of the innovators, whether they are professionally and ethically driven to deliver affordable, accessible quality care, with patient information gotten through informed consent and securely stored, or they are just / mostly commercially and profit driven, leveraging on new technology!
We hope that the Government of Nigeria would soon come up with a policy on the use of mobile phones and other new technologies in healthcare delivery, because they are spreading fast even to the very remote health facilities and communities. And that when the Policy is released, it is followed, not like some existing policies, such as the one on access to Prescription Only Medicines which is ignored across board, with deadly consequences for patients and the population.
Joseph Ana.
Prof Joseph Ana
Lead Senior Fellow/ medicalconsultant.
Center for Clinical Governance Research & Patient Safety (ACCGR&PS) @ HRI GLOBAL
P: +234 (0) 8063600642
E: info@hri-global.org
8 Amaku Street, State Housing, Calabar,Nigeria.
www.hri-global.org
HIFA profile: Joseph Ana is the Lead Senior Fellow/Medical Consultant at the Centre for Clinical Governance Research and Patient Safety in Calabar, Nigeria, established by HRI Global (former HRIWA). He is a member of the World Health Organisation’s Technical Advisory Group on Integrated Care in primary, emergency, operative, and critical care (TAG-IC2). As the Cross River State Commissioner for Health, he led the introduction of the Homegrown Quality Tool, the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance Programme, in Nigeria (2004-2008). For sustainability, he established the Department of Clinical Governance, Servicom & e-health in the Cross River State Ministry of Health, Nigeria. His main interest is in whole health sector and system strengthening in Lower, Low and Middle Income Countries (LLMICs). He has written six books on the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance programme, suitable for LLMICs, including the TOOLS for Implementation. He served as Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association’s Standing Committee on Clinical Governance (2012-2022), and he won the Nigeria Medical Association’s Award of Excellence on three consecutive occasions for the innovation. He served as Chairman, Quality & Performance, of the Technical Working Group for the implementation of the Nigeria Health Act 2014. He is member, National Tertiary Health Institutions Standards Committee of the Federal Ministry of Health. He is the pioneer Secretary General/Trustee-Director of the NMF (Nigerian Medical Forum) which took the BMJ to West Africa in 1995. Joseph is a member of the HIFA Steering Group and the HIFA working group on Community Health Workers. (http://www.hifa.org/support/members/joseph-0 http://www.hifa.org/people/steering-group). jneana AT yahoo.co.uk