The ministry of health has made several strides in ensuring e-health becomes a priority through several partnerships with various stakeholders both nationally and internationally as it looks to fulfill its goals for 2020.

“The Internet helps us to track patient records as well as the Health Management Information Systems which provide aggregated health data easing the work of decision makers in the health sectorts,” said Edith Munyana head of the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) at the ministry.

“One example is ‘Rapid’ SMS which follows the 1,000 days from when the mother is expecting until her due date and tracks the health of children under five,” said Ms Munyana.

The Electronic Medical Records System is used in several hospitals across the country.

Zipline, a start-up from the Silicon Valley announced it was partnering with the government to launch drones that supply blood known as “Zips.” Their work will be a first and as the creator “Rwanda has a vision to become a technology hub for East Africa and ultimately the whole continent of Africa,” said William Hetzler, a founder of Zipline.

Another startup company from the United Kingdom, Babylon health created by Dr Ali Parsa will launch its app Babyl in October. Health centres across the country will have booths for people with feature phones to access the call centre especially when the patient needs to have a video call with the doctor.

“In the UK it is an app because many use smartphones but in Rwanda since the majority own feature phones, we have developed a feature phones version developed by Rwandan and UK developers. The code *811# will be effective for all feature phones,” said the CEO Babyl Rwanda, Tracey McNeill.

Dr Deogratias Ruhangaza, a pathologist at Butaro Hospital, in the Northern Province extols the virtues of the iPath. “We send “slide images” in JPEG format.

Expert opinion

We just send few case images that are challenging just for expert opinion (without putting patient’s particulars in order to save their privacy). We use the iPath network where we upload our case images.

iPath network works as a closed and secured pathologists’ discussion group where they can share their point of view on a an uploaded case. The comments can only be given by pathologist members of the group and in our case, pathologists from Brigham and Women’s hospital in Boston,” he said.

As reported by United Nation’s online paper, Africa Renewal, “Another e-health programme in Rwanda is the Treatment and Research Aids Centre (TRAC), which was established in 2005.

TRAC is a digital system that collects, stores, retrieves, displays and disseminates critical information about drug distribution and HIV/Aids patient information. The system enables anti-retroviral treatment practitioners to submit reports electronically and have access to information.”

Medicine at your fingertips seems like something near to impossible but with the ICT innovations taking place these seemingly impossible ventures are achievable thanks to Rwanda’s open-armed policy on Internet innovation in the country.