Doro

Doro is a mobile application that manages all aspects of hospital operations such as consultation, appointments, finances and medical records.

The Doro mobile application is an integrated health application developed in Cameroon with an entire concept to facilitate hospital transactions. It; connects patients to medical doctors, enables patients to book appointments with a doctor, facilitates hospital consultation, stores patients medical records electronically, reduces hospital operation cost, enable easy transmission of health-related information from the ministry of public health to patients, permits patients to have a chat with a doctor from the comfort of their home and improves patient-doctor relationship.

The technology used by Doro is cloud-base technology which enables its users to access the same information from almost any device.

I'm trying to solve the problem of health-care access. In most African countries, particularly Cameroon, patients face difficulties accessing medical care as they have to trek/ travel for long distances to a hospital. After reaching the hospital,they queue for a long period of time before seeing the doctor. In other cases, they don't get to see the doctor at all as they may visit the hospital when the doctor is not around. Situations like this discourages many patients from going to the hospital at times. Doro solves this problem as patients will be able to book their appointments with a doctor through the app and get to visit the hospital at the scheduled time.

Also, most sub Saharan African inhabitants still uses notebooks for hospital consultations and medical record storage. Most people oftentimes misplace these notebooks which create difficulties to some medical personnel to make use of past data so as to administer treatments. This creates problems as some doctors end up giving some drugs to patients who are allergic to it.

Lastly, I'm trying to solve the problem of misinformation/ disinformation concerning health issues. For example, the manufacture of the coronavirus vaccine came with so many misinformation that created fear in the heart of many people which caused them to abstain from getting the vaccine. Through Doro, I will tackle the problem of misinformation concerning health through the “manage info” section of the application.

The target population whose lives I'm working to directly and meaningfully improve are patients and doctors in the sub Saharan regions of Africa. Their lives will be positively impacted by my solution as it will help to reduce hospital operation cost; thereby reducing cost too on the patient’s side. 

My solution will address their needs as it will help them to keep track of all their hospital transactions details/ data and easily access them wherever there are.

I have taken several steps so as to understand the needs of the population I want to serve through question and answer sessions. I have spoken with some registered and unregistered users of Doro and asked them some series of questions concerning their medical needs and what they think about my product. 

In summary, most of them said there are wowed by the Doro project and that with the system in place, most of their hospital transactions will be facilitated. Some users said there are satisfied with the system just for the fact that they will have their medical records handy with them wherever they go. Another user, Ekiti Dorcas recounted a problem she faced some time ago which my product now solve. She said they was once a time she was recommended to a specialist in a different region which is about 275km from her own region. She travelled this distance to go and see the doctor, but unfortunately, when she reached there, she found out that the doctor had travelled abroad to catch up with some things. So, she ended up not seeing the doctor. She concluded by saying if Doro was existing within that period, she would have booked her appointment with the doctor before travelling. In that case, she would be sure of meeting the doctor.

I selected pilot as the stage of development of my product because my product has already been developed and is in the testing phase. I am compiling reviews and feedback from both patients and doctors and making adjustments so as to solve their problems accurately and meet their needs.

My product is currently being tested in Bamenda, Cameroon. The testing is being carried out with 20 patients (both young and old) and two medical doctors. 

The core technology that powers our solution is cloud computing; which is the practice of using a network of remote servers hosted on the internet to store, manage, and process data, rather than a local server or a personal computer.

Presently, my solution is in the testing stage and I have 22 registered users whom we are doing the testing with. We are gathering vital information on how to better serve their needs.

We envision to serve the over 7.87 million internet users in Cameroon by next year and possibly extend our solution to other African countries.  

My impact goals for the next year is to;

 - Improve individual’s health and living standard. This will be achieved through the connections we will create with doctors and hospitals that will permit us to link them up with all patients despite the patient’s financial status.

 - Decrease mortality rate. This goal will be achieved as we will ease the means of making doctors available at emergency scenes.

 - Create jobs. Through the proper execution of the Doro project, jobs will be created which will help to curb unemployment.

 - Persuade many individuals into getting themselves vaccinated against the deadly corona virus disease. This will be achieved through the “manage info” section of the application. We will send out information persuading individuals on why they need to get vaccinated and forget about any myths they might have heard.

We plan on measuring our progress towards our impact goals by studying the variations in pattern in:

 - The number of lives saved and doctors availability during emergency situations

 - The living standard of Doro users compared to non-users

 - The number of people getting vaccinated against the coronavirus disease before, during and after the implementation of Doro.

The barriers that we are currently facing towards achieving our next year goals are:

 - Inadequate finance to promote our product so as to reach out to our targeted population, get our project registered and pay stipends to current workers at Doro.

 - Poor internet service availability.

 - Not everybody in sub Saharan Africa is in possession of a smart phone device as all Doro users will need a smartphone before accessing the platform.

 - Fears from users over their data privacy. We remember one of the users asking if it's any doctor that will have access to view his medical records?. The response was/ is- Doro has been programmed in a such a way that upon registration, each patient is attributed a unique identification number; this is the number which you give to a doctor to search for you before he will be able to see you or any information concerning a user on the platform. Without this number, no doctor can see anything about a patient.. Hence, privacy is enhanced.

My team and I are well-positioned to deliver this solution due to the divers knowledge we have acquired from volunteer and work experiences. We are driven by our believe in tailored tech solutions to global problems. 

Sama Lesly Tankfu is an advocate for change, a programmer, a tech-head and an innovative problem solver. He sought to solve problems that impact the real world and have participated in several initiatives and programs that gears towards reforming our society. In 2019/2020, he served as an ambassador at world literacy foundation where he lifted young people out of poverty through literacy and organized an online fundraising campaign that yielded the distribution of over 7500 book packs to kids. In 2020, he participated in the Inspire Africa for global impacts initiative program where he led campaigns and discussions on equipping underserved youths in Africa with digital literacy and soft skills. 

Api Precious who works as a promoter at Doro is the founder of SMN Media which aim at empowering young women in media technology while creating audio-visual contents. So far, she has worked with 10 girls directly. Through Draufsicht Bamenda, she work as a communication Officer and assistant project manager. Precious coordinates community and film making activities that involve over 20 young volunteers. In 2020, she coordinated the installation of 15 hand wash stations in some communities in Bamenda in order to support them fight the spread of COVID-19.

Bonjoh Thank-God Rinwi is a medical student who works as a collaborator at Doro. He's worked as a volunteer at the Bamenda Regional Hospital where he helped to record medical history and symptoms, administer medications and treatments, perform diagnostic tests.and actively participated in campaigns on how to curb the spread of Neglected Tropical Diseases and Coronavirus.

We are currently in partnership with Draufsicht- Bamenda in the implementation of our project. (Draufsicht-Bamenda is an association of young, committed people, drawn from diverse backgrounds and consolidating their diversity and efforts towards social change).

Our vision partnering with Draufsicht Bamenda is to leverage on our local efforts to address critical social/humanitarian issues. 

One of the primary goal of the Doro project is to improve the quality of life for women and girls. By doing so, we envision to create a conducive environment characterized by equal representation of gender so as to build an inclusive society. In order to attain this, we work with Api Precious who coordinates young women and girls empowerment in media technology while creating audio-visual contents. So far, we have been able to work with 10 girls directly. In 2021, we organized over 50 women and young people in Cameroon to be trained by ImpactHer and GOOGLE on Google Digital skills.

Winning The Pozen Social Innovation prize will be an added advantage to us as we will use the money to push through with this initiative to many communities  so as to reach out and empower more women and girls.