-
The Promise of eHealth in the African Region
Most African patients making repeat visits to a hospital or to their doctor are likely to have had at least one similar experience: they routinely see their doctor or other hospital staff digging through stacks of ancient manila files in search of handwritten notes of their medical records. The patients will even be lucky if their files are found with complete information. Must this decades-old practice continue in this information age? “No”, says Dr Derege Kebede, head of the African Health Observatory (AHO) and Knowledge Management Unit at the WHO Regional Office for Africa Office (WHO/AFRO) in Brazzaville, Congo. “A solution already exists: electronic health or eHealth – countries and people in our region should embrace, promote and intensify the use of eHealth.”
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
-
Antibiotic apocalypse
The indiscriminate prescription of strong antibiotics for even minor ailments like cold and flu is leading to the alarming rise of bacterial infections that no longer respond to the usual medicine
- Categories
- Health Care
- Region
- South Asia
-
‘Personalized’ Vaccines Help Treat Chronic Leukemia
Patients with advanced chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) often receive donor transplants that effectively “reboot” their own immune defenses, which then attack and potentially cure the hard-to-treat disease.
- Categories
- Health Care
-
Fat profits: how the food industry cashed in on obesity
Ever since definitions of healthy bodyweight changed in the 1990s, the world has feared an obesity epidemic. But the food giants accused of making us fat are also profiting from the slimming industry
- Categories
- Health Care
-
How to Foster Low-Tech Health Innovation
A Seattle non-profit's model for uniting public health and the private sector, and what they've come up with
- Categories
- Health Care
-
Needed: Boring Health Care Solutions: Does global health have an unhealthy fixation on innovation? (Bi-Weekly Checkup, 8/3/13)
Does global health have a decidedly unhealthy fixation on innovation? Is there too much focus on flashy technological solutions to persistent health problems, and not enough on the slow, “boring” approaches that often bring more lasting results? We discuss the issue in NextBillion Health Care’s Bi-Weekly Checkup.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
-
Colombia is world’s first country to wipe out river blindness – WHO
Colombia has become the first country in the world to eradicate river blindness through the distribution of an anti-parasitic drug in affected parts of the South American nation and a sustained health education campaign in local communities, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.
- Categories
- Health Care
- Region
- Latin America
-
Breast-feeding woes: Mexico sees dramatic drop of moms nursing, raising concerns over health
Despite the well-known advantages to breast milk and vigorous campaigns around the world championing breast as best, Mexican mothers say the bottle is better.
- Categories
- Health Care
- Region
- Latin America