FRANKLIN, Tenn., Dec. 27, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- After kicking off 2016 and celebrating its fifth anniversary by ringing the NASDAQ closing bell, Health eVillages continued to make an impact on global health throughout the year. From funding and opening a new maternity wing at Lwala Community Hospital in Kenya, to adding two community partners in the USA and forging new collaborations with healthcare, human rights and mobile technology organizations, Health eVillages made a difference in the lives of those most in need.
Founded in 2011, Health eVillages focuses on enabling safe and efficient medical care in the most challenging clinical environments through mobile healthcare technology. The organization provides mobile medical and training resources to healthcare professionals working in underserved communities in Haiti, East Africa, India and the U.S. and addresses healthcare challenges, including infant and maternal mortality, tropical diseases, preventive healthcare and well-being improvement.
“When I look back on 2016, I will remember this as a year in which we made a profound difference in thousands of lives across the globe,” said Donato Tramuto, Healthways CEO and Health eVillages Founder and President. “During a life-changing visit to Kenya, I personally witnessed the impact Health eVillages has made in educating and arming community health workers with mobile technology filled with medical information they use daily to care for pregnant women, infants and children, and how access to this technology and information is saving lives.”
Seed Global Health
Health eVillages launched a collaboration in July with Seed Global Health (Seed) to help overcome critical shortages of health providers and build strong, sustainable health systems by cultivating the next generation of local doctors and nurses. The Health eVillages and Seed collaboration focused on three nursing schools - Muni University and Lira University in Uganda and Phebe Hospital and School of Nursing in Liberia. Health eVillages donated and programed tablets with a unique array of resources to help Seed’s clinical team, the nurse educators, and faculty at the partner institutions address specific educational needs. In addition to serving as an education and training resource for the nurse educators and their colleagues during the next year, the Health eVillages tablets will remain as a resource for the partner academic institutions after the departure of the volunteers.
“Health eVillages is an elegant solution to the chronic problem of difficulty getting access to textbooks and reference materials in Liberia. Students and faculty with the Anesthesia Program at the Phebe Paramedical Training Program and School of Nursing in Suakoko, Liberia, are delighted to not only have current texts, but also to be able to quickly and easily search for one topic through all texts at once with the tablet’s Omnio system. The portability of the such a vast array of books make it convenient for faculty to expand on impromptu teaching moments in the operating theater as an opportunity arises. The apps allow students to watch procedure videos at the point of care for step by step guidance - like a personal tutorial session - and the additional memory capacity allows faculty to customize the tablets to this specific anesthesia program,” said Mary O’Sullivan, Seed volunteer in Liberia.
PCS Wireless Tablet Donation
In October, Health eVillages received an extremely generous donation of 200 iPads from PCS Wireless – the first shipment of a remarkable 1,000 iPad commitment. These iPads will help drastically cut the costs of the Health eVillages program and enable it to reach thousands of additional health care providers and the communities they serve around the world. Health eVillages has started deploying these devices, loaded with medical reference materials for training clinicians and educating patients to its partners in East Africa, Haiti and the United States.
“After five years of responding to human rights and healthcare needs across the globe, we have learned it takes strong collaborative IQ and viable partnerships to truly make a difference,” said Tramuto. “I would like to thank PCS Wireless for their generous donation of 1,000 tablets. It’s awe-inspiring to know we will be able to save thousands of lives through this technology.”
Heal-the-Villages Awards
Five health care leaders who have made significant advances in improving access to care across the globe were honored at the Health eVillages Fifth Anniversary Celebration in February in New York City. The 2016 Heal-the-Villages Award winners each exhibited the spirit of Health eVillages through the leadership of significant healthcare initiatives. The 2016 honorees were Alex Gorsky, Patrick J. Kennedy, Wycliffe Omwanda, James Nardella and Jena Lee Nardella.
Lwala Community Hospital Maternity Wing
In April, Tramuto and the core Health eVillages team traveled to Kenya to participate in the ribbon cutting for a new maternity wing at the Lwala Community Hospital. Funding for the wing came from dozens of individual donors to Health eVillages, including Tramuto’s own private foundation. The expansion offers increased access to high-quality healthcare throughout the year, including the peak malaria season. It also increases the hospital’s capacity to provide HIV-AIDS enrollment and care, family planning, maternal and child health services, adolescent sexual and reproductive health services, and other services that will contribute to an improved quality of life for the surrounding community.
The new wing includes 12 patient beds, two exam rooms for outpatient visits, full separation of the well-child visit area from sick-patient areas, separate men’s and women’s in-patient wards, a pharmacy and new laboratory space with specialized rooms for blood drawing, sterilization and microbiology and a new space for HIV-AIDS counseling.
Safe Delivery Application Partnership
Health eVillages began including the Safe Delivery app on mobile devices provided to clinical health workers who care for pregnant women. The app, developed by the Maternity Foundation, University of Southern Denmark and the University of Copenhagen, provides instructions for health workers attending to complicated deliveries and includes animated video guides on how to address problems such as prolonged labor, hypertension and maternal sepsis. The information is based on the World Health Organization’s clinical guidelines, and health workers using the app have access to a list of common drugs associated with childbirth, with information on recommended dosages and side effects.
Health eVillages – Healthways Community Outreach Program
Healthways, Inc. (NASDAQ:HWAY) and Health eVillages launched an initiative to improve community health in underserved areas in February. The Health eVillages – Healthways Community Outreach Program focused on improving the quality of and access to care in the most challenging clinical environments, both in the U.S. and abroad.
The first beneficiary of the Health eVillages – Healthways Community Outreach Program was Mercy Community Healthcare, a non-profit organization that provides quality healthcare to the underserved and uninsured in more than 30 counties in Middle Tennessee. The Foundation for Senior Living (FSL) in Phoenix, Arizona, is the second beneficiary of the Health eVillages – Healthways Community Outreach Program. FSL exists to improve the quality of life for adults and their caregivers and operates an integrated system of care that allows adults to age in place through their continuum of home and community-based health services. FSL serves more than 10,000 clients throughout Arizona.
“I would also like to recognize and thank our existing and new partners, including Seed, Mercy Community Healthcare and the Foundation for Senior Living. In addition, we have exciting programs planned in 2017, including supporting Partners in Compassionate Care in South Sudan. I’m looking forward to the New Year as we continue to ‘heal the villages’ across the globe,” said Tramuto.
About Health eVillages
Health eVillages collaborates to advance healthcare access and improve quality of care by providing state-of-the-art mobile health technology including medical reference and clinical decision-support tools, as well as other resources, to medical professionals in the most challenging clinical environments around the world. Our partners include Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Seed Global Health, Global Impact, WelVU, Aptus Health, Healthways, Sharecare and more. You can find more information at http://www.healthevillages.org/ and follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.