Intuica

The most vulnerable populations across Africa live very far from hospitals and when an individual experiences Covid-19 symptoms, their only option is to travel a significant distance to a health post. Once there, they may be referred to another healthcare facility to receive the appropriate level of care, thereby requiring even more traveling. All of these journeys can create multiple points of contact, spread the virus, but they are also time-intensive, exhausting for ill individuals, and are anxiety-inducing.    

Intuica is a multichannel communication platform for users to easily communicate their symptoms (via SMS, WhatsApp, or calling) and get directed to an appropriate treatment centre, all in the comfort and safety of their own home.  A Geographic Information System (GIS), is also integrated to  visualize cases as well as displays the availability of healthcare facilities. Most importantly, this solution is scalable post-Covid-19 for other disease outbreaks globally.

The most vulnerable populations across Africa live very far from university-level teaching hospitals and when an individual experiences Covid-19 symptoms, their only option is to travel to the nearest health post to get some answers (i.e. if they have Covid-19, where they should go to next, etcetera). Oftentimes, individuals must still travel a significant distance to reach one of these health posts. Furthermore, once an individual reaches a health post, they may be referred to another healthcare facility to receive the appropriate level of care, thereby requiring even more travelling. This suggested healthcare facility may not even have the capacity to take on additional patients, resulting in an ill and potentially contagious individual being redirected to another facility. Not only do all these journeys have the potential to create multiple points of contact, thereby spreading the virus, but they are also time-intensive, exhausting for ill individuals, and are anxiety-inducing. On a final note, an individual may not even get the care that they need because they want to avoid the hassle of having to travel to even just communicate their symptoms at a health post.

Intuica is a multichannel communication platform for users to easily communicate their symptoms and get directed to an appropriate treatment center, all in the comfort and safety of their own home. “Multichannel” refers to the ability for users to use their phones (smart phones or flip phones) to communicate their systems through our platform by dialing a short code (calling), texting a short code (SMS), or texting a WhatsApp number. Additionally, our solution involves the African community health workers—trusted individuals who have existing relationships with African communities—to provide phone access to community members who do not own a phone so that they can still utilize our platform and receive the care that they need. What takes our solution to the next level is our Geographic Information System (GIS), which enables the visualization and monitoring of confirmed and suspected Covid-19 cases in communities, as well as records and displays the availability of healthcare facilities so that users can be directed to a facility that has the capacity to care for additional patients. 

Ultimately our target population is the urban and rural communities across Africa, however in the near term we aim to hyper focus on the rural communities in Nigeria. Nigeria is the tech hub in Africa and rural communities live very far from university-level teaching hospitals, thereby forcing individuals to travel long distances to a health post and then to a subsequent hospital if needed. One of our team members is a doctor in Africa, therefore she knows the healthcare landscape quite well. She mentioned that some people in these communities actually avoid going to the health posts altogether because they want to avoid the long travel and would prefer to stay at home and expereince the symptoms. Intuica makes it easy for them. All they need is a phone (and if they don't have one, the Community Health Workers do) to communicate their symptoms, learn whether they need medical attention and subsequently get directed to the nearest available healthcare facility. The travel distance is trimmed down and by making the user experience seamless, community members will get the answers they need to receive the help they deserve.

Rapid response - Intuica allows for increased case identification and detection. Resultantly, individuals can know in minutes whether they should seek treatment or not. If they do need treatment, a facility is suggested.

Track the spread of an emerging outbreak & Enhance disease surveillance systems - The GIS will allow for the mapping of cases that were flagged as potential COVID cases in addition to cases that were subsequently confirmed at healthcare facilities. That way, surges can be measured, monitored, and analyzed.

Prevention - This could prevent outbreaks from occurring by allowing for increased detection and therefore increased treatment measures. 

What makes our solution innovative is the fact that we are making healthcare convenient and patient-obsessed; which is not the current focus in Africa. The Intuica flow is seamless, its digital, and it is convent. Healthcare access from home, although common in the Americas, is unheard of in Africa. Intuica aims to make that possible. 

Intuica will utilize Twilio for programming our SMS, voice call, and WhatsApp interfaces. We will use Flask to run our web server and connect with the API in Twilio. By using a queue-based system, Intica is able to support a high volume of users. To map our patient and hospital data, we will be utilizing GeoJSON APIs. Algorithms will be created for analyzing digital triage symptoms from patients and hospital capacity/distance/level of care to best suggest facilities for patients. 

This technology exists in the US, in Canada, and all over the world. At its core, it is a digital triage survey that assess symptoms, and makes recommendations. 

Activity: Tools for user to communicate their symptoms easily and safely

Output: More individuals will seek medical care because their initial trip to get answers about their illness is prevented and they will receive exact directions on the healthcare facility they should go to. 

Short-Term Outcome: Increased Covid detection and increased treatment provided. Individuals will feel empowered to take their health into their own hands. 

Long-term Outcome: Other disease can be detected using the Intuica to pass individuals through the digital triage, and to recommend treatment, which could ultimately prevent other outbreaks. 

Currently we are still in the user testing phase (small sample sizes of friends, family and nieghbours) and rapid prototyping phase, therefore we have not fully launched yet. 

Current Number: 0 

Number in 1 Year: 195 million

Number in 1 Year: 1.2B

Next Year: To be integrated into the healthcare systems of Nigeria, thereby impacting 195 million people. 

Five Years: To be all across Africa, impacting 1.2B people.  

Mission : To provide an inclusive referral  platform that empowers people to access the healthcare services they need, as well as increases communication transparency between healthcare facilities and community health workers. 

Vision: To revolutionize the current healthcare referral framework using a patient-centered approach and cutting-edge technology. 

1. Establishing and maintaining relationships with the African Governemnt

2. Money to maintain and further build out the technology, to pay for labor. etc.

3. Manpower on the development side of things

1. We are reaching out to NGOs who have ties with governments to initiate conversations and build relationships. 

2. Apply to MIT Solve, as well as other funding from academic institutions and other organizations. 

3. We are currently recruiting another developer to help

n/a

Total Part-time Staff: 7

Developer: Adel Bene (full-time)

Project Leader, Biz Dev, and Finance : Gabriella Paniccia  (full-time)

Medical : Ezinne Peters (full-time)

Medical : Emmanuella L. Salia (full-time)

UX/UI Design : Aishwariya Chandra  (full-time)

Developer: Kelly Qiu (full-time)

People/Team Management: Tobore Edema (full-time)

Our multidisciplinary team of seven co-founders consists of physicians, developers, UX designers, bioengineers, and business development experts that are from five countries across four time zones. 

Adel Bene is a seasoned cybersecurity and AI developer in Nigeria with experience at YCombinator. He is the lead developer on our team. – 

Gabriella Paniccia is an MBA candidate from Canada with professional experience in investment banking, at a biotech startup, a bank's innovation lab, and at a consulting firm. She is the finance lead, the lead of funding sourcing, and the project manager. Gabriella also prepares and presents the pitch decks. 

Ezinne Peters is a physician in Nigeria with prior experience working at the CDC. She is very familiar with the healthcare landscape in many African countries and is well-connected with key stakeholder groups in the African healthcare space. 

Emmanuella L. Salia is a physician currently working at John's Hopkins and has lived in Ghana for most of her life. Emmanuella is also is well-connected with key stakeholder groups in the African healthcare space. 

Aishwariya Chandra is a UX/UI designer in India and she designs the user interfaces for our technology. 

Kelly Qiu is a biomedical engineering and computer science student from the United States who brings experience from the pharmaceutical industry and is instrumental to coding the frontend and backend of our technology. 

Tobore Edema is a biomedical engineer Master's student who grew up in Nigeria. Having lived in Nigeria, Tobore brings valuable insight about the country's current healthcare landscape. 

We are currently technically partnered with MIT and are waiting on them to get back to us with partnership opportunities with external firms.

We are ultimately selling the Intuica platform to hospitals and other healthcare facilities in Africa. All profits generated will be reinvested into the business. 

We are all about serving the African community, making healthcare accessible to all, and ultimately revolutionizing the healthcare system, therefore focusing on profit does not align with our goals. 

We have received some funding from the MIT hackathon as well as from the University of Indiana, however we aim to fund this venture by continuing to apply for grant/funding opportunities. To become financially sustainable, this would involve securing enough contracts with healthcare facilities to generate sufficient revenue such that we can eek out a profit to reinvest into the company.  

MIT Solve would of course help us overcome our financial barrier. 

MIT Solve would also provide amazing mentorship and strategic advice opportunities. 

We are looking for partners who can provide strategic advice on how to succeed with a B2B model in healthcare, how to navigate the African legal landscape, how much to charge our customers, how to measure our success, and overall help guide us in making important decisions.  

We are open to partnering with organizations and people that have experience with one or more of the following : 

1) Healthcare sector

2) Non-profit sector

3) African healthcare landscape

Many African women with children cannot affair to leave their home to travel to communicate any unusual symptoms because they need to care for their children and earn money for the family. Intuica gives them the ability to stay at home and communicate their symptoms to receive the answers and next steps that they deserve.