The Communication Initiative
Development action with informed and engaged societies
The Communication Initiative
After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future.
 
Co-founder Victoria Martin is pleased to see this work continue under Wits' leadership. Victoria knows that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction.
 
We honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades. Meanwhile, La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA) continues independently at cila.comminitcila.com and is linked with The CI Global site.
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Lessons from the field: ICTs and Healthcare

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Summary

According to this article, information and communication technologies (ICTs) are increasingly being used to facilitate two-way information exchange in healthcare. This exchange is designed to provide isolated communities worldwide with access to updated health information and treatment, as well as to keep officials informed about rural public health issues. This trend is significant, the authors claim, because the majority of the population in developing countries lives in rural areas, while the majority of the medical community is centred in the cities. In India, for example, 80% of the population is served by only 20% of doctors. This trend, they say, leaves the 11% of those living in rural India without high-quality healthcare.


The article details some of the tools being used to facilitate this knowledge exchange:

  1. Online health information and portals that include The Health InterNetwork project, The AfriAfya Initiative, and INASP Health Links.
  2. Telemedicine initiatives that are designed to bring advanced diagnostic methods and treatment to areas that currently have little access. Some hospitals are starting their own programmes, like The Aravind Eye Hospital's efforts to help eradicate blindness by using Internet-connected kiosks. Other programmes work with existing healthcare facilities, as in the case of DoctorAnywhere.com, Pesinet (Senegal), and TelMedPak (Pakistan).
  3. Projects that utilise phone networks in new ways to improve health services. For instance, South Africa's ExactMobile is using phones to enable doctors to receive detailed laboratory test results on the same day the samples were submitted. Other projects detailed in the article include On-Cue Compliance (South Africa), the Voxiva Health Alert and Reporting System (Peru), and the Videophone Telemedicine Project (Indonesia).
  4. Handheld computers that bring healthcare to rural areas. To cite one example, The HandyVaid initiative uses PDAs to collect information from villagers using a pre-designed consultation form. This information is then transferred to a doctor in the city, who diagnoses the problem and suggests appropriate treatment, precautions, and medication. The doctor's diagnosis and suggested treatment is then transferred to the PDA and carried back to the villager.

This article also includes an option to search the Clearinghouse for almost 50 related healthcare initiatives that use ICT.


Click here for the full article on the World Resources Institute Digital Dividend site.


Source

iConnect Highlights, sent via email to Ghana Information Networking and Knowledge Sharing (GINKS) on July 31 2003.