NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Telemedicine Africa has collaborated with Dimension Data and the IDC to set up private telehealth centres in South Africa.

The virtual eHealth centres will use a public-private partnership (PPP) model to provide nurses at primary care clinics with workstations that boast video conferencing infrastructure connected to medical devices, such as electronic stethoscopes and blood pressure machines, to examine a patient. The patient information is then sent to a doctor or specialist remotely to make an informed diagnosis.

In an interview with eHealthNews, Telemedicine Africa Managing Director and one of the creators of the telemedicine workstations, Dr Moretlo Molefi, explained that clinics and hospitals would continue to contract different types of specialists on specific days of the week as they do currently. However, the use of telemedicine will ensure that patient waiting times are reduced in an efficient and cost effective manner.

“We understood the need for a user friendly system for nurses and we developed our workstations in collaboration with Stellenbosch University, SUNPA and the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) as a model for all developing countries,” said Molefi.