In the developing world, there are only about 11 million hospital beds but 300 million computers and 2.2 billion mobiles. "If you consider [this] you can instantly see how mobile networks can create effective solutions to address healthcare challenges," says Ahmad Abdulkarim Julfar, the group chief executive of Etisalat, the telecommunications company. Mr Julfar discusses why Etisalat is pushing new mobile health (mHealth) technology, such as its Mobile Baby app, which combats maternal deaths linked to childbirth in developing countries.
How does mobile technology help to provide affordable healthcare, even in the most remote areas?
Mobile technology provides us with tools to do things quicker, better and more efficiently. It's transforming the provision of quality health care in a number of ways - by accelerating the collection and storage of patient data, training rural professionals and personalising the way patients receive medical treatment.
Can mHealth address concerns in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena)?
Diabetes, for example, is a major issue across the Mena region, and it is a good example of how mHealth can help patients through remote patient monitoring. The World Health Organization predicts that the number of diabetes patients in the Mena region will reach 51.7 million by 2030, and it is estimated that diabetes alone will cost the UAE Dh10 billion [US$2.72bn) a year by 2020 if the condition is not treated. If a diabetes patient learns to use a Dh110 monitoring device that records and relays data to a central healthcare centre by mobile data signals, this can reduce healthcare costs by 40 per cent per annum.
How is the growing prevalence of mHealth apps affecting investments in technology that transfers data, such as 3G and LTE data networks?
There are already more than 200 million mobile health applications in use worldwide today, according to a report from Pyramid Research. By next year, there will be 400,000 more as the [adoption of] electronic medical records gathers pace. The rise of tablet PC devices and mHealth apps means that telecommunications providers have to rise to the challenge of providing sufficient bandwidth to connect doctors to outpatients to transport high-volume data, high-resolution imaging and facilitate quick download of information. These elements need sophisticated and advanced mobile broadband technologies like 3G and LTE to support them, which is one of the reasons why Etisalat is rolling out LTE networks across the markets in which it operates.
What other mHealth initiatives has Etisalat helped to develop?
Through our Etisalat operating company Zantel in Tanzania, we recently launched a mobile health platform in partnership with Qualcomm and D-tree International. It uses mobile technology to support front-line healthcare providers in offering high-quality counselling, preventive care and treatment to women and children. We initiated the programme because maternal fatalities are estimated at 50 times higher in sub-Saharan Africa compared to developed countries. Nearly half a million women on the continent die each year in pregnancy and 4 million newborns die during the first 28 days.
* The National staff
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