Sustaining Digital Health begins with a well informed workforce!

This week I attended a program at the U.S. Embassy Zambia and had the opportunity to interact with some Zambia's finest minds doing amazing things in the different fields.

On a networking follow up chat with one medical student in her final year, I brought up a discussion around digital health.

Attached in the picture below is what her reply was!

This is a fine leader, creating impact in her community and finalizing her medical studies and yet she was not so familiar with what digital health is about, what of an average person?

Sometime last year, I was at a certain hospital mentoring a group of qualified medical doctors on digital health and telemedicine, they were learning most of the things for the first time and got shocked to the point of asking me how long it took me to master the field of digital health.

This simply shows that we have much work to do where digital health education is concerned. If we have to sustain it, we need a well-informed workforce.

In this age of digital transformation, it should be considered a crime if organizations and people are not repositioning themselves to leverage on new technologies to enhance service delivery.

Below are some ways I propose we can create awareness around digital health.

1. Assess the Needs: Start by assessing the current level of digital health literacy among the health workers. This will help us identify knowledge gaps and tailor trainings accordingly. We can conduct surveys, interviews, or focus groups to gather information about their existing knowledge and comfort level with digital technologies.
2. Develop a Curriculum: We need to design a comprehensive curriculum that covers the key aspects of digital health. Include topics such as electronic health records (EHRs), telemedicine, mobile health applications, health information exchange, data privacy and security, and digital health regulations.
3. Provide Training Materials: There is need to prepare educational materials, such as presentations, handouts, and online resources, to support your training sessions. We also need to ensure that the materials are user-friendly, visually appealing, and accessible to all participants.

We need to remember that teaching digital health is an ongoing process. Technology and best practices evolve rapidly, so it's important to foster a culture of continuous learning and adaptation among health workers to ensure they stay updated with the latest advancements.

World Health Organization

Africa CDC