10mg Health

The problem we are addressing revolves around the lack of affordable healthcare access, specifically for chronic pain management, in underserved communities. This issue is prevalent not only locally but also globally, impacting over 1.5 billion individuals worldwide.     We cater to a significant and overlooked demographic of chronic pain sufferers in Africa, accounting for 70% of chronic pain-related deaths worldwide, highlighting the urgent need for accessible healthcare solutions. Chronic pain affects millions of individuals, with conditions like cancer, chronic arthritic condition,  and sickle cell disease, which contribute to a substantial portion of pain-related death.  According to global statistics, Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 80% over half a billion child birth with sickle cell disease in the last 5 years and a child as young as 1 year could experience a painful crises once a week at least and up to 5 times a day, creating a strong and consistent demand for the medications. Despite the pressing need for healthcare solutions, healthcare insurance coverage remains low at just over 10% of the population, leaving many individuals without financial protection. Additionally, medication costs are significantly higher, up to 6 times the regular price, further straining resources in underserved communities. Compounding the problem, healthcare providers face challenges accessing loans due to exorbitant interest rates exceeding 30% and stringent collateral requirements from traditional lenders. These factors collectively contribute to limited healthcare accessibility and exacerbate the burden of chronic pain for millions of individuals, highlighting the urgent need for accessible and affordable healthcare solutions.

Our solution at 10mg Pharma aims to provide accessible and affordable healthcare solutions for chronic pain management in underserved communities, particularly in Africa. We leverage technology, specifically AI, to address the challenges of high medication costs and limited access to financing for healthcare providers.

Here's how it works: 

1. Low-Interest Loans: We facilitate collateral-free loans for healthcare providers through our AI-driven platform. This enables them to access the funding they need to expand their services and reach more patients, especially those in underserved areas. Our AI-driven technology uses a process called KYC (Know Your Customer) to verify the identity and eligibility of healthcare providers. This includes analyzing their background, financial history, transactional patterns and risk assessment  on our platform to ensure they meet the criteria for accessing loans. Once verified, the technology connects them with UK-based financial institutions(we are register in the UK as 10MILESGREEN LTD, Reg. No.: 1480994) that offer single-digit interest rates. Importantly, these loans are provided without requiring collateral, making it easier for healthcare providers to access the funding they need to serve their communities. Notably, $59,300 has been disbursed in the last one year to over 312 healthcare providers, increasing their patients reach by over 150%.

2. Discounted Medications: By securing high level partnerships with medication manufacturers, we secure significant discounts on the medications which are offered to healthcare providers. This also helps reduce the financial burden on patients and makes essential treatments more accessible.

4. Impact Measurement: We implement a robust impact measurement mechanisms using our end-to-end inventory management system to track and evaluate the effectiveness of our interventions in improving healthcare accessibility and positive outcomes in the form of price reduction of up to 15%. This allows us to continually optimize our services and make a meaningful impact in underserved communities.

Overall, our solution leverages technology to address the complex challenges of healthcare accessibility and affordability, particularly for chronic pain management. By providing low-interest loans and discounted medications, we aim to empower healthcare providers and improve the lives of millions of individuals affected by chronic pain in underserved communities.

Target Population:

- Underserved communities in Africa, particularly those lacking access to affordable healthcare for chronic pain management.
- Healthcare providers serving these communities, including hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies.

Current Challenges:
- High medication costs: Medications for chronic pain management are prohibitively expensive, exacerbating the financial burden on both healthcare providers and patients.
- Limited access to financing: Traditional lenders impose high interest rates and collateral requirements, making it difficult for healthcare providers in underserved areas to access the funds needed to expand their services.

Solution:
1. Low-Interest Loans: Collateral-free loans provided through an AI-driven platform connect healthcare providers with UK-based financial institutions offering single-digit interest rates. This empowers providers to expand their services and reach more patients, particularly in underserved areas.
2. Discounted Medications: Partnerships with medication manufacturers secure significant discounts on essential treatments, reducing financial strain on patients and making medications more accessible to underserved communities.
3. Impact Measurement: Robust mechanisms track and evaluate interventions' effectiveness, ensuring up to a 15% reduction in medication prices. This continuous optimization aims to make a meaningful impact in underserved communities, improving healthcare accessibility and affordability for chronic pain management.

We, at 10mg Pharma, are exceptionally suited to design and deliver solutions for Africa's healthcare challenges, especially in chronic pain management. Our cofounders, Christian and Joy, share a profound commitment to social impact and have extensive experience in outreach to underserved communities. As YALI and TEDx fellows from Aston University, Christian brings over a decade of industry experience, including serving as a pharmaceutical company's Head of Business. He intimately understands the challenges faced by healthcare providers and patients in accessing chronic pain medications, having witnessed the struggles firsthand. With an MBA and MSc from Aston University, Christian leverages his expertise in pharmaceutical business management to drive our initiatives forward.

Joy, with 5+ years of Social Impact experience and a background in founding She Connect Africa, brings a deep understanding of non-profit operations and project management to our team. Collectively, we possess over 20 years of experience, and our unique insights into the African healthcare landscape have been instrumental in securing strategic partnerships with medication manufacturers and fintech lenders. Through our unwavering commitment to making a positive impact in emerging markets, we've achieved a 15% reduction in medication costs for patients and facilitated access to $59,000 of collateral-free loans for healthcare providers.

Our extensive knowledge of the community and expertise in navigating healthcare pain-points in Africa have guided the design and implementation of our solutions. With over 1 million patients reached in the last 12 months and the potential to reach over 2 million patients per month by 2028, we are confident that our team's collective experience and dedication will continue to drive impactful solutions for providing affordable chronic pain medications to healthcare providers in Africa.

At 10mg Pharma, we've developed and tested our AI-driven platform for providing low-interest loans and discounted medications to healthcare providers in underserved communities. Our platform underwent rigorous testing for functionality, security, and usability, incorporating continuous improvements from user feedback.

As for customers served, we have successfully onboarded over 3,300 healthcare providers onto our platform, enabling them to access affordable medications and financing options. Additionally, we generated a revenue of $305,000, with a monthly recurrent revenue(MRR) of $24,000 and our platform has facilitated access to low-cost chronic pain medications for over 159,000 patients per month in underserved communities in Nigeria(our pilot country). Importantly, 67% of patients reached are underserved communities and 42% are women over 50years in age.

Through our efforts, we have disbursed $59,300 in collateral-free, low-interest loans to over 312 healthcare providers in the past year alone, empowering them to expand their services and reach more patients. These loans have directly contributed to improving healthcare accessibility and outcomes in underserved areas, making a tangible difference in the lives of both healthcare providers and patients. We have recently signed a significant partnership deal with PNA(The Pharmaceutical receiving hub of Senegal, servicing over 4000 healthcare providers), enabling us to scale into francophone Africa.

At 10mg Pharma, we face key drawbacks that we hope Solve can help us overcome:

1. Technical Support: Solve's personalized support program can provide technical expertise and guidance to enhance our AI-driven platform's functionality, security, and scalability. This assistance can help us overcome technical challenges and optimize our platform for better performance.

2. Legal Guidance: Solve can connect us with legal experts who can provide guidance on regulatory compliance, intellectual property protection, and contractual agreements. This support can ensure that we navigate legal complexities effectively and mitigate legal risks as we scale our operations.

3. Cultural and Market Insights: Solve's cross-sector community can offer valuable cultural and market insights specific to the regions we operate in. This understanding can help us tailor our solutions to better meet the needs and preferences of diverse communities, leading to greater acceptance and adoption of our platform.

4. Access to Additional Funding: Solve's network can connect us with potential investors and grant providers who share our mission of improving healthcare accessibility in Africa. This additional funding can support our expansion efforts, technology development, and impact scaling.

In essence, Solve's comprehensive support program, coupled with personalized assistance and access to a diverse network of founders, mentors, and partners, offers invaluable resources such as technical support, legal guidance, cultural insights, and additional funding opportunities. This collective assistance is pivotal in overcoming barriers and amplifying the impact of our solution on healthcare accessibility in underserved African communities. Moreover, the 9-month program ensures tailored support from Solve staff and a cross-sector community, empowering us with essential expertise and resources to propel our mission forward effectively.

Our solution at 10mg Pharma approaches the problem of healthcare accessibility in underserved communities, particularly in chronic pain management, in a novel and significantly improved way. Unlike traditional approaches that rely solely on medication distribution or financing options, our platform integrates both aspects to provide a comprehensive solution.

Firstly, we leverage AI-driven technology to facilitate collateral-free loans for healthcare providers, enabling them to expand their services and reach more patients in underserved areas. This innovative approach addresses the financial barriers that often hinder healthcare providers from delivering quality care.

Secondly, we negotiate partnerships with medication manufacturers to secure discounted medications, making essential treatments more affordable for patients. By addressing both the financial and medication access aspects simultaneously, we offer a holistic solution that tackles the root causes of healthcare disparities.

Our approach has the potential to catalyze broader positive impacts from others in the healthcare space. By demonstrating the effectiveness of integrating financing and medication access, we can inspire other organizations and stakeholders to adopt similar strategies. This could lead to a shift in the market landscape towards more holistic and patient-centered approaches to healthcare delivery.

Furthermore, our platform has the potential to change the market landscape by promoting transparency and efficiency. Through our AI-driven technology, we create a streamlined process for healthcare providers to access loans and medications, reducing administrative burdens and costs. This efficiency could incentivize more players to enter the market, leading to increased competition and ultimately benefiting patients through lower costs and improved access to care. Overall, our solution has the potential to drive systemic changes in the healthcare industry, leading to broader positive impacts for underserved communities.

Our Theory of Change at 10mg Pharma outlines how our activities lead to immediate outputs and longer-term outcomes for our target population in underserved communities:

Activities:
1. Facilitating Collateral-Free Loans: We leverage AI-driven technology to connect healthcare providers with financial institutions offering collateral-free loans at just 4% per annum.
2. Securing Discounted Medications: We negotiate partnerships with medication manufacturers to secure discounted prices for 34% for chronic pain medications.
3. Implementing Impact Measurement: We use our end-2-end inventory management system as measurement mechanisms to track and evaluate the effectiveness of our interventions for the patients.

Outputs:
1. Increased Access to Funding: 312 Healthcare providers gain access to $59,300 in low-interest loans without the need for collateral, enabling them to expand services and reach more patients.
2. Affordability of Medications: Patients benefit from discounted medications, by saving up to 15% costs, reducing their financial burden and improving treatment adherence.
3. Enhanced Operational Efficiency: Our impact measurement systems provide valuable insights for optimizing our interventions and ensuring efficient service delivery.

Outcomes:
1. Improved Healthcare Access: Our system has enable 3,300 healthcare providers reach over 159,000 patients monthly, an increase by 300%. Noteworthily, 67% are in underserved communities,  and 42% are women over 50years in Northern Nigeria, increasing the availability of essential healthcare services.
2. Better Patient Outcomes: Patients experience improved health outcomes due to increased access to affordable medications and expanded healthcare services.
3. Sustainable Impact: By addressing the root causes of healthcare disparities, our interventions create long-term, systemic changes that benefit underserved communities.

Evidence supporting our Theory of Change comes from various sources, including:
- Findings from process evaluations, highlighting the direct link between our activities, outputs, and outcomes.
- Data from interviews with healthcare providers and patients, confirming the positive impact of our interventions on their lives and communities.

Our impact goals at 10mg Pharma are centered around transforming healthcare accessibility and outcomes for underserved communities in Africa:

1. Increase Healthcare Access: Our primary goal is to expand access to essential healthcare services, particularly chronic pain management, by enabling healthcare providers to reach more patients in underserved areas.
   - Indicators: Number of healthcare providers onboarded onto our platform, number of patients served monthly, geographic distribution of services, and demographics of patients reached.

2. Improve Patient Outcomes: We aim to enhance health outcomes for individuals suffering from chronic pain by ensuring they have access to affordable medications and quality healthcare services.
   - Indicators: Reduction in medication costs for patients, improvement in pain management outcomes, adherence to treatment plans, and patient satisfaction with services.

3. Foster Economic Empowerment: By providing collateral-free loans and reducing medication costs, we seek to empower healthcare providers economically and contribute to the financial stability of underserved communities.
   - Indicators: Amount of loans disbursed to healthcare providers, increase in revenue for healthcare facilities, and economic impact assessments on communities served.

4. Promote Gender Equity: We are committed to addressing gender disparities in healthcare access by ensuring that our interventions benefit women, particularly those in marginalized groups.
   - Indicators: Proportion of female healthcare providers accessing loans and utilizing medications, gender breakdown of patients served, and empowerment initiatives targeted towards women.

5. Drive Systemic Change: Our overarching goal is to catalyze systemic changes in healthcare delivery systems, policy frameworks, and market dynamics to create lasting improvements in healthcare accessibility and affordability.
   - Indicators: Policy changes influenced by our initiatives, partnerships with government agencies and NGOs, and market penetration of our solutions.

To measure our progress towards these impact goals, we employ a combination of quantitative and qualitative indicators, including data on service usage, patient outcomes, economic indicators, and feedback from stakeholders. We regularly conduct impact assessments, surveys, and evaluations to track our performance and identify areas for improvement, ensuring that our efforts are effectively addressing the needs of our target population.

At 10mg Pharma, our core technology revolves around leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to power our solution for improving healthcare accessibility in underserved communities. Our AI-driven platform facilitates two key components of our solution: 

1. AI-Powered Loan Facilitation: We utilize AI algorithms to analyze data and assess the eligibility of healthcare providers for collateral-free loans. This involves implementing a Know Your Customer (KYC) process to verify the transactional identity, payment patterns and risk assessment, allowing us to connect them with financial institutions offering low-interest loans. The AI technology streamlines the loan application process, ensuring quick and efficient access to funding for healthcare providers without the need for traditional collateral.

2. Data Analytics and Optimization: Additionally, our platform leverages AI-powered end-to-end inventory management systems to meticulously track and appraise the impact of our interventions on healthcare accessibility and patient outcomes. By analyzing metrics such as patient reach, medication adherence, and financial impact, we gain valuable insights that inform decision-making and optimization of our services. This data-driven approach enables us to continuously refine our solution and maximize its impact on the communities we serve.

Overall, our core technology harnesses the power of artificial intelligence to address the complex challenges of healthcare financing and medication accessibility in underserved communities. By leveraging AI algorithms for loan facilitation and data analytics, we aim to streamline processes, optimize outcomes, and ultimately drive positive change in healthcare delivery for the benefit of people and the planet.

full-time staff- 4

part-time staff- 12

contractors- 32

11th October 2022

1yr 4months

At 10mg Pharma, we are deeply committed to fostering a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace culture where every team member feels valued, respected, and empowered to contribute their unique perspectives and talents. Here's how we ensure diversity, minimize barriers to opportunity, and promote inclusivity within our team:

1. Diverse Leadership Team: Our leadership team reflects a diverse range of backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives. As co-founders, Christian and Joy bring different skill sets, expertise, and lived experiences to the table, contributing to well-rounded decision-making and strategic direction.

2. Recruitment and Hiring Practices: We prioritize diversity and inclusion in our recruitment and hiring processes by actively seeking out candidates from diverse backgrounds and underrepresented groups. We implement blind screening techniques and conduct structured interviews to minimize biases and ensure fair evaluation of candidates.

3. Training and Development: We invest in ongoing training and development opportunities for all team members to enhance cultural competence, unconscious bias awareness, and inclusive leadership skills. Training sessions on diversity, equity, and inclusion topics are integrated into our professional development programs.

4. Open Communication and Feedback: We foster a culture of open communication and feedback, where team members feel comfortable sharing their thoughts, concerns, and suggestions for improvement. Regular check-ins and anonymous feedback mechanisms allow us to address any issues or challenges promptly.

5. Inclusive Policies and Practices: We have established inclusive policies and practices that prioritize work-life balance, flexibility, and accommodations for diverse needs. This includes remote work options, flexible scheduling, and comprehensive healthcare benefits.

6. Continuous Improvement: We continuously assess and evaluate our diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, seeking feedback from team members and implementing strategies for improvement. We set measurable goals and track progress towards achieving greater diversity and inclusivity within our team.

By prioritizing diversity, equity, and inclusion, we believe we can unlock the full potential of our team and drive innovation that truly reflects the needs and aspirations of the diverse communities we serve.

At 10mg Pharma, our business model revolves around providing value to both healthcare providers and patients in underserved communities, focusing on improving healthcare accessibility and affordability for chronic pain management. Here's how our business model works:

Key Customers and Beneficiaries:
1. Healthcare Providers: Our primary customers are healthcare providers, including medical doctors, nurses, and pharmacists, who operate in underserved communities across Africa. These providers are often faced with challenges accessing affordable medications and financing to expand their services.

2. Patients: Our primary beneficiaries are patients in underserved communities who require access to essential medications for chronic pain management. These patients often face barriers such as high medication costs and limited healthcare infrastructure, hindering their ability to receive adequate treatment.

Products and Services:
1. Collateral-Free Loans: We provide healthcare providers with access to collateral-free loans through our AI-driven platform. These loans enable providers to invest in expanding their services, purchasing essential medical equipment, and hiring additional staff to meet the healthcare needs of their communities.

2. Discounted Medications: We negotiate partnerships with medication manufacturers to secure discounted prices for chronic pain medications. These medications are then made available to healthcare providers at reduced costs, enabling them to offer affordable treatment options to patients.

3. Impact Measurement: We implement an end-to-end inventory management system to track and evaluate the effectiveness of our interventions in improving healthcare accessibility and patient outcomes. This allows us to measure the impact of our services and make data-driven decisions to optimize our offerings.

How We Provide These Products and Services:
- Our AI-driven platform serves as the central hub for facilitating collateral-free loans, securing discounted medications, and measuring impact. Healthcare providers can access these services through a user-friendly interface, streamlining the process and ensuring efficiency.
- We leverage strategic partnerships with financial institutions and medication manufacturers to ensure the availability of loans and discounted medications for our customers.
- Our team provides ongoing support and assistance to healthcare providers, guiding them through the loan application process, facilitating medication orders, and offering training on how to maximize the impact of our offerings.

Why They Want or Need Them:
- Healthcare providers want access to affordable financing and medications to expand their services and improve patient care in underserved communities.
- Patients need access to affordable medications for chronic pain management to alleviate suffering, improve quality of life, and enhance overall health outcomes.
- Our offerings address these needs by providing accessible financing options and discounted medications, ultimately improving healthcare accessibility and affordability for both providers and patients.

Key aspects of our business model at 10mg Pharma include:

1. **Customers and Beneficiaries**: Serving healthcare providers and patients in underserved African communities.
2. **Products and Services**: Offering collateral-free loans, discounted medications, and impact measurement tools.
3. **Service Delivery**: Utilizing an AI-driven platform for streamlined access and leveraging strategic partnerships.
4. **Needs Addressed**: Fulfilling the need for affordable financing and medications, improving healthcare accessibility and affordability.
5. **Impact**: Enhancing patient care, quality of life, and overall health outcomes through innovative solutions.