ICT4D | TechChange | The Institute for Technology and Social Change

Did you see Facebook’s Safety Check feature recently? Did you use it?

Following the recent earthquake in Nepal, Facebook activated “Safety Check“, a feature that helps friends and relatives quickly find out whether their loved ones are safe. Safety Check was originally launched in October 2014 and was mainly based on experiences gained during the 2011 earthquake and Tsunami in Japan.

The idea is very simple: In case of a large scale emergency, Facebook can use the information it is constantly collecting about its users to determine who is likely to be in the affected area. It then asks these users to confirm whether they are safe and shares that information with their facebook friends. Alternatively, people can also report their facebook friends as being safe and those marked safe can see who marked them. People can also say “I’m not in the area”.

Safety Check is a dormant Facebook feature that is only activated when necessary. One thing that I had been curious about since the launch was how well Facebook would be able to determine whether someone was in the affected area.

According to the original press release:
“We’ll determine your location by looking at the city you have listed in your profile, your last location if you’ve opted in to the Nearby Friends product, and the city where you are using the internet.”

Indeed I quickly heard from two former colleagues who were in Nepal: One of them lives permanently in Kathmandu but was actually on a plane when the earthquake happened. In his case, Facebook assumed he was still in Nepal, because his phone was off at the time of the quake. In the absence of current information, Facebook took his home city and/or his last location, which was at the airport, to include him in the group of affected people.
The other person I know normally lives in the UK but was in Nepal on a trip. In his case, Facebook used the IP address of his last login to estimate his location.

Users see how many of their Facebook friends are
in the affected area and how many are safe.

Why this is relevant
Anyone who has ever been in a situation where family members or close friends are in danger, knows that finding out what happened to them is one of the first things on your mind. Not knowing is not only a source of great anxiety, but it can actually be dangerous if you yourself are also close to the affected area:

Think of a father who knows that his daughter was at a shopping mall downtown when the earthquake struck. If he doesn’t know what happened to his child, he will probably run to the shopping mall to find out. By doing so he can put himself at risk and he will not be at home to look after the other children when a strong aftershock occurs. He will also try to call his daughter every 5 seconds, thereby accidentally helping to crash the phone network.

On the other hand, we have now seen in a number of disasters that internet connections frequently remain functional (if slow) even when phone and SMS networks are down – to a large part because many people open their WiFi networks to let others use the internet.
Using social media is also much more efficient since one “I am safe” update will reach all of one’s friends, making multiple calls unnecessary, thus reducing further load on the telecommunications infrastructure.

The application also shows clearly whether people have
reported themselves as safe or whether others have done so for them.

Why this is better
Of course, there are also other systems to find out whether friends and family are safe. Google, for example, has its “Person Finder“. The Red Cross Red Crescent Movement has been providing tracing and restoring family links services for many years and local government authorities, as well as embassies, are also very much involved in these tasks.

However all of them require that a (distressed) user finds out about these services and actively registers or gets in touch with them. That is a lot to ask of someone who just survived a disaster. Facebook’s Safety Check on the other hand is part of the normal Facebook application that most people are already familiar with. This reduces the barrier to share and receive information significantly which in turn reduces the load on the other, more sophisticated, systems like the Red Cross’ tracing program. Facebook’s Safety Check can provide clarity in many of the easy cases, freeing up resources for the difficult ones.

What do you think about Facebook’s Safety Check? Let us know by commenting below or tweeting at us @TechChange. This post originally appeared on Social Media 4 Good

Interested in learning about other ways technology is being used in disaster response? Join us in our upcoming online course on Technology for Disaster Response that begins on June 22.

About author

Timo Luege, TC103: Technology for Disaster Response Facilitator

After nearly ten years of working as a journalist (online, print and radio), Timo worked four years as a Senior Communications Officer for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) in Geneva and Haiti. During this time, he also launched the IFRC’s social media activities and wrote the IFRC social media staff guidelines. He then worked as Protection Delegate for International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Liberia before starting to work as a consultant. His clients include UN agencies and NGOs. Among other things, he wrote the UNICEF “Social Media in Emergency Guidelines” and contributed to UNOCHA’s “Humanitarianism in the Network Age”. Over the last year, Timo advised UNHCR- and IFRC-led Shelter Clusters in Myanmar, Mali and most recently the Philippines on Communication and Advocacy. He blogs at Social Media for Good.

Technology has been known to facilitate anonymous harassment online, but in India a non-profit organization is using mobile apps to fight harassment on the streets. I came across Safecity in my Mobile Phones for International Development course, and since I plan to return to India and pursue my career in promoting gender equality, the case study of Safecity reducing gender-based violence (GBV) caught my attention.

How Safecity Works
Safecity is a non-profit organization in India that offers a platform for individuals to anonymously share their stories of sexual violence or abuse. This crowdsourced self-reported data is then displayed on a map of India to show hot spots and patterns of violence in various parts of the country. Safecity collects this data through its website, social media platforms, and via email, text or phone to increases awareness of the various kinds of GBV, ranging from catcalling to groping to rape. It also allows Indian individuals, law enforcement agencies, neighborhoods, businesses, and the society at large to access this data and to use it to take precautions and devise solutions.

Safecity reports

Why Safecity Works
As one of the founders of Safecity put it, the three main reasons that rape and other sexual harassments are underreported in India is because people are afraid to report it, the police manipulate the data, or because victims are deterred by the delayed justice system. This, along with the cultural stigma attached to talking about sexual harassments, makes anonymity for victims very important. Allowing for anonymous reporting, Safecity has collected over 4000 stories from over 50 cities in India and Nepal since it launched in December 2012.

How Safecity is Using Mobile Apps
Along with collecting and visualizing data, Safecity promotes a variety of phone applications to help sexual minorities feel safe in public spaces:

GeoSure (provides personalized travel safety content via mobile)
Nirbhaya: Be Fearless (emergency app that sends a distress call or emergency message to a specified contact or group)
SafeTrac (allows automatic monitoring and tracking of your journey)

Safecity also promotes services like Taxshe, a safe all-female driver service, and KravMaga Chennai, a self-defense teaching service.

Challenges and Looking Ahead
As with many ICT4D solutions, access to the technology remains an important barrier. Safecity and its advertised applications, products and services seem to only reach a very specific target audience (urban populations with access to modern technology), leaving behind illiterate populations from rural areas with no access to technology. With their missed dial facility, Safecity is hoping to reach out to women with limited access to technology by recording their reports of abuse and harassment over the phone and suggesting appropriate interventions.

I look forward to seeing how Safecity uses this form of community engagement and crowdsourced data to not just report, but reduce GBV in India. This course introduced me to a new and unique way to address the pervasive issue of GBV in India and I look forward to utilizing the tools and lessons learned in making India a gender equitable country one step at a time.

Interested in learning about other ways mobile tools are helping communities address different problems? Join us in our upcoming Mobiles for International Development online course that begins on May 11.

Author Bio

Nikita Setia is a M.A. candidate at the Elliott School of International Affairs in the International Affairs Program, concentrating in development. She previously earned her B.B.A in Economics, International Business, and Management at Northwood University in Midland, Michigan.

It may be difficult to see the relevance of 3D Printing beyond maker labs, but its potential to help in international development, and especially humanitarian response should be explored further.

In 2013 alone, there were more than 334 natural disasters around the world resulting in more 100,000 deaths. While the numbers decreased in 2014, in 2015 we are already seeing the devastating effect of the earthquake in Nepal. Not only do natural disasters claim lives, they also disrupt the supply chain, making it difficult for those affected to access basic goods and services. While it may not be applicable in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, 3D printing can help with recovery from a disaster by filling the gap in the supply chain.

3D printing is changing what you can produce and where you can produce it, making it a solution that could meet the needs of people after a humanitarian crisis.
Here is why:

Low cost
3D printers are no longer out of our reach. As they are becoming more sophisticated and affordable and many patents are expiring, there are now a wide range of consumer 3D printers available for purchase. Field Ready launched a pilot in Haiti where they test-manufactured a variety of umbilical clamps, enough to supply a local clinic for a month. Along with that, they also printed a prosthetic hand, items to repair and improve the printers, butterfly needle holders, screwdrivers, pipe clamps, and bottles. Being able to 3D print medical equipment on site can save costs in purchasing and transporting them from outside, allowing the funds to be used for other important resources that need to be delivered.

Portable
Not only can 3D printers manufacture basic supplies at a low cost, they are also portable so they can be easily transported anywhere there is a need. Many supplies and materials are delivered to disaster affected areas from off-site, creating wait time and possibilities of the supplies getting damaged in transit. It can be a great relief to know that you can print basic necessities like medical tools, or materials to construct a shelter on-site before more permanent supplies are delivered to you.

Immediate correction
Communication can be difficult during a crisis, and sometimes relief delivery of supplies may not fit the requirements of the needs. In this case, it takes more time and money to correct the situation. With a 3D printer, you can immediately change the design of the product you are imagining and test print multiple versions in a short time until you end up with your desired final product.

While the solutions may sound exciting, we have to be mindful of the fact that disaster-stricken places may not have resources needed to run 3D printers. Electricity, human capital, and availability of raw materials are just a few potential barriers. So, organizations like Field Ready are exploring solar powered 3D printers and have already tested a basic curriculum to teach locals how to design items and use the printers. While there is more to learn on what is possible with 3D printing, the possibilities it offers for humanitarian response are endless.

We will be exploring topics like this and other ways 3D printing is being used for social good, as well as hear from experts who are already using 3D printers in this context and can see its potential for society, in our upcoming course on 3D Printing for Social Good.

There is still time to apply, so I hope you can join us!

Photo credit: myAgro

The current financial model of banks cannot address what development experts call the “triple whammy” of poor peoples’ lives – they struggle with low savings, uncertainty of cash flows, and the inability to access formal financial instruments. Small farm holders in the developing world face similar struggles as they often have to purchase seeds and fertilizers in one large payment to improve their harvest. MyAgro, provides an innovative alternative to farmers, eliminating the need for banks and placing financial decision-making in the hands of small farm holders.

MyAgro helps farmers purchase agricultural tools on layaway via an SMS platform and a network of local vendors. Anushka Ratnayake started myAgro in 2011 as a pilot program in Mali and soon expanded it to Senegal. MyAgro’s success can be attributed to their approach of using a mobile phone platform to adapt current pro-poor financial methods to addressing the financing problem in the agricultural sector.

How does myAgro work?
MyAgro works much like someone going to top up their phone for additional talk time at their local store. Participating farmers purchase scratch-off cards (ranging from $.50 to $10) with a unique pin number. This pin number is sent to myAgro and is recorded in their database under the farmer’s profile. An SMS is sent back to the farmer notifying them of how much they have saved towards their goal (to purchase fertilizer, seeds, or agricultural training). Once this amount is reached, the farmer receives the tools or service they have purchased from myAgro.

Why does myAgro’s model work?
MyAgro’s model gives rural farmers access to key financial services including cash-flow management and savings, through this approach:

Reliability
Without the credit and collateral that banks require when opening a savings account, poor people have responded by forming rotating savings and credit funds (ROSCAs) within their communities. This has been replicated worldwide, helping families manage scarcities. However, this informal tool does not provide the accountability, reliability and privacy that banks would offer. MyAgro builds on the success of ROSCAs, where people save through small incremental amounts over the long-term, but with the security and reliability of a formal mobile platform.
Convenience
MyAgro clients don’t have to travel long distances to access banks, which is especially useful for rural farmers living in remote areas where bank branches do not exist. MyAgro also increases inclusion by making the system easy to use, especially for those who are illiterate. Getting the basic use out of myAgro only requires the farmer to SMS the numbers located on the card they purchased. In addition, no physical cash is involved. In mobile cash transfer platforms such as the successful M-PESA program, some local vendors run out of cash when a customer wants to conduct a transaction, myAgro only relies on digital transactions – a successful approach within cash-strapped countries.
Flexibility
By allowing farmers to choose how much to save on a given day, myAgro takes into account the variety of shocks that vulnerable populations experience, such as illness in the family or natural disasters. The mobile platform allows them to use their small-scale savings for large-scale purchases.

In just three years, myAgro has managed to address a debilitating financial problem in farming communities in the developing world by providing a reliable and accessible savings tool and allowing farmers to managing their cash flows on their own terms. I look forward to seeing how myAgro expands its current 6,000 farmer membership while also collaborating with other mobile technology platforms to continue providing information and financial services to the benefit of the poor.

Interested in learning more about other ways mobile phones are empowering people in the developing world? Join us in our upcoming course, Mobile for International Development that begins on May 11.

About author

Ana Tamargo is a development professional and recent graduate from the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University. She recently received a master’s degree in International Development Studies. During this time, Ana completed TechChange’s “Mobile Phones for International Development” course in order to advance her knowledge in using innovative information and communication technologies to facilitate programming and data collection within the local context. She has worked at international NGOs such as Pact, World Cocoa Foundation, and the Rainforest Alliance and has expertise in program advancement, evaluation and research in the fields of sustainable natural resource management, rural poverty alleviation, and bottom-up development. Ana is eager to continue findings ways to incorporate mobile phone technology in helpingempower and provide services to vulnerable populations.

Photo credit: Lokesh Todi

On Saturday morning, I woke up to numerous messages on whatsapp and facebook from my friends in India asking me if my family was safe. After listening to a voicemail from a Nepali friend based in Boston, I found out about the earthquake that had hit my country. It didn’t take long after I turned on my computer to see how big the devastation was. My heart sank to my stomach and I was in tears as I mindlessly added credit to my Skype account and repeatedly dialed my parent’s mobile number.

After multiple tries, I was able to get in touch with my family. While I cried throughout the entire call, I was reassured that they were all safe. Fortunately, my family survived this terrible tragedy and was able to stay safe in tents in open spaces near their neighborhood during the more than 100 aftershocks. Unfortunately, however, the 7.9 magnitude earthquake that struck Nepal has swallowed up whole neighborhoods, villages and along with it thousands of people. The death toll is rising as we speak and is estimated to reach around 10,000.

Being this far away from Nepal, I feel very helpless. But technology has allowed me to stay connected with my family and other Nepali communities helping respond to the disaster:

Free Calls to Nepal
Shortly after the earthquake, many phone companies and messaging apps started providing free calls to Nepal. Viber, Skype, and Google Voice are allowing free calls to mobile and landlines in Nepal along with many other phone companies like AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and others. This may seem like a small gesture but for a Nepali living abroad, it is a huge relief to be able to constantly contact family members and people requesting and responding to the crisis during this tragic time.

Mapping
Numerous mapping communities have deployed their teams online to map the crisis in Nepal so that the pleas for help can be detected and resources delivered.

Map of Damages in Nepal from the earthquake created by SBTF on MicroMappers

I have joined two Atlas Corps Fellows, Medha Sharma, and Luther Jeke to team up with Standby Task Force to help map the affected communities in Nepal by using MicroMappers. Medha and I have reached out to our Nepali networks in and outside of Nepal to help advise the SBTF team by relaying information about ongoing requests for help or offers of assistance. We are also helping translate Nepali tweets, facebook updates, and news articles so that they can be mapped. We have recruited more than 100 Nepali expats and residents to help us with this effort.

Two days ago, I was able to call Dr. Anil Shrestha in Bir Hospital to notify him that we saw his request for a list of medical supplies through Facebook and found a donor willing to provide them. We have connected the two parties and are awaiting confirmation from Dr. Shrestha that he has received the supplies from the Kathmandu airport. You can read about the Standby Task Force’s other small successes here. If you would like to join the SBTF team or have experience living in Nepal and know the community, please email me at samita@techchange.org to join this effort.

Kathmandu Living Labs is leading the mapping efforts on the group in Nepal, but you can also join the mapping effort for Nepal relief with Maptime DC, Tomnod, or Humanitarian OpenStreetMap.

Online Fundraisers
Many organizations and individuals have started fundraisers online to allow the global community to help in Nepal’s recovery.

Two of the alumni from my high school have started a fundraiser on Indiegogo that will direct the funds to local NGOs that may not have connections outside of Nepal to raise a lot of money.

Facebook has launched a campaign to match donations of up to $2 million to the efforts in Nepal. Phone companies have made it easy to donate to the earthquake relief in Nepal through your mobile phones:

AT&T customers, text “NEPAL” to 864233 to make a $10 donation to UNICEF
T-Mobile customers, text NEPAL to 20222 to donate $10 to Save the Children
Verizon customers, text “REDCROSS” to 9999 to donate $10 to The Red Cross

Drones
Unmanned aerial vehicles or drones, are playing an important role in the response to the earthquake in Nepal too. Because of a shortage of manned helicopters, the effects of the earthquakes in the most rural parts of Nepal are still unknown, and this is where drones will step in, allowing manned helicopters to continue with rescue missions.

Here is a drone footage of Kathmandu after the earthquake taken by Kishor Rana’s drone.

UAViators founder Patrick Meier said that if you have a drone and want to help, get in touch with the Humanitarian UAV Network and read the Network’s Code of Conduct to help with this effort.

This is the worst earthquake to hit Nepal in 80 years, and the many pictures online show the devastating effect it had on my country. The damages are worst in the areas that have not yet been reached by media or rescue teams. The consequences of this tragedy will affect my country long after the media turns its attention away and we need all the help to rebuild.

If you are a mapper or own a drone, please volunteer your time and skills and join one of the online communities. You can also donate online. You don’t have to go to Nepal to help, in fact, please don’t, unless you are a trained professional for crisis situations. You can do your part to help Nepal with the help of ICTs from wherever you are.

If you are interested in learning how social media and technology is helping in disaster response, join us in our upcoming course on Technology for Disaster Response that begins on June 22.

By Samita Thapa and Sara Pitcairn

The possibilities for 3D printing are endless. While this may scare some of us, the potential for innovation is exactly what excites us here at TechChange! Imagine being able to quickly manufacture reconstruction materials for disaster response, 3D print homes in refugee camps, or 3D print a human heart to save a life.

But this cutting-edge innovation can also seem difficult to wrap your head around. How does it work? How do you begin? Here is an example of how an idea can become a product through 3D printing:

Dr. Boris Paskhover at the Yale School of Medicine saw a need for a portable transnasal laryngoscope with image and video capture capabilities. A transnasal laryngoscope is a handheld medical device that allows Ear, Nose, and Throat (ENT) physicians to examine a patient’s voice box and diagnose and treat ENT disorders (such as cancer of the throat or thyroid). But the equipment that captures images and videos from a laryngoscope, an endoscopic tower, is expensive and difficult to transport, making it infeasible for use outside of a hospital setting.

Imagine
Dr. Paskhover imagined an easier way to visualize the results of a laryngoscope examination. By using his Phone camera and an app called Luma to produce higher quality video and pictures, he could see the results anywhere. To start with, he created a makeshift attachment to secure a laryngoscope to his iPhone case. But ideally, he imagined a more robust solution for his work in rural settings outside the U.S.

Dr. Paskhover’s make-shift attachment for his iPhone 4 case

Design
He worked with Sara Pitcairn, TechChange’s Co-Director of Instructional Design, during her senior year at Yale University to bring his idea to life. Through an iterative, human-centered design process, Sara modeled, prototyped and 3D printed an iPhone case with an interface aligning the eyepiece of a laryngoscope with an iPhone camera. The iphone case allowed Dr. Paskhover to capture high-quality photos and videos of his exams with patients without the need for an endoscopic tower.

Designing and testing the 3D printed iPhone case

3D Print

See the 3D printed iPhone case in action:

This is one of many examples of how 3D printing is helping fill gaps that exist in healthcare. There are countless applications in other fields, and especially in disaster response and international development.

Do you have other examples of how 3D printing is being used in your communities? Share them with us in the comments section or tweet at us @TechChange

If you are are interested in learning more about the potential 3D printing offers in your field, join Sara in our upcoming course on 3D Printing for Social Good. We will look at applications of 3D printing in a variety of contexts, along with the challenges and opportunities as the field continues to advance. After the four weeks of the course, you will have a solid understanding of 3D printing so that you can see its potential for your field of practice. We will look at case studies and examples of where 3D printing is being used today and will help you find a maker community, as well as connect you with experts using 3D printing for social good.

The course begins on May 4, we hope you can join us!

What does humanitarian response look like today? With so much information available, how can we use big data effectively for humanitarian efforts?

Joins us on May 5 for a free webinar with Patrick Meier to chat about his new book, “Digital Humanitarians: How Big Data is Changing Humanitarian Response.” Join the conversation and hear Patrick’s insights on his latest book.

May 5, 2015 at 10:00 – 11:00 am EST

Patrick is an internationally recognized thought-leader on humanitarian technology and innovation. He directs QCRI’s Social Innovation Program where he develops “Next Generation Humanitarian Technologies” in partnership with international humanitarian organizations. His new book “Digital Humanitarians” has already been endorsed by Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Oxford, UN, World Bank and the Red Cross.

Patrick also founded/co-founded CrisisMappers, Digital Humanitarians, MicroMappers, Humanitarian UAV Network and the award-winning Standby Task Force. He has a PhD from The Fletcher School, Pre-Doc from Stanford and an MA from Columbia. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, BBC, Forbes, Times, Wired and Mashable. Patrick’s influential blog iRevolutions has received over 1.5 million hits. He tweets at @patrickmeier.

Watch Patrick’s TEDx Talk: Changing The World, One Map At a Time.

We hope you will join the conversation on May 5. Sign up now!

Wondered who designs and teaches our online courses? You met one of our course facilitators Kendra Keith in a previous post, and today we introduce you to Norman Shamas.

As TechChange’s Director of Curriculum and Pedagogy, Norman brings his passion for education to designing online courses. Norman facilitates our popular online course on Technology for Monitoring and Evaluation and will be co-facilitating our newest course on Technology for Data Visualization this summer. He also facilitated our previous Mapping for International Development course and our customized course on Technology for International Development for IREX.

Norman has quickly become a thought leader in the field of technology for social good. He was recently invited to be part of the review committee for the Development Impact Lab’s Spring Innovate Grant. Additionally, he is also helping lead important conversations on gender and digital security and bringing important techniques and technologies from data science into conversations around monitoring and evaluation.

Before joining TechChange last year, Norman was at Creative Associates International where he developed an internship program. He completed his graduate studies at the University of Minnesota (where he was a graduate student instructor) and undergraduate studies at Arizona State University.

Join Norman in his upcoming Tech for M&E online course that begins Monday, April 20!

By Samita Thapa and Kendra Keith

When we interviewed Nobel Peace Prize winner, Muhammad Yunus, at the 2013 mHealth Summit, he said that mobile phones are the “Aladdin’s lamp for healthcare”, a statement that still rings true today. Two years after that interview, we take a look at how digital health is beginning to expand beyond mobile phones. Mobile phones – especially smartphones – have been revolutionary in health care, especially in developing countries. With budding industries like add-ons to smartphones and wearable tech, the mHealth landscape is evolving.

Here are 5 digital health tools that extend beyond the mobile phone:

1. Pre cancer screening phone attachment

Photo source: Cellphone Beat

In areas of the world with high amounts of tobacco consumption and limited access to affordable dental care, oral cancer is a major concern. Oral cancer can be prevented with early detection and to equip rural health workers, the OScan team at Stanford university has developed a screening tool that mounts on a camera phone and conducts screenings for oral lesions. The data can then be transmitted to dentists and oral surgeons for assessment. OScan is in the process of conducting field tests with grants from Stanford, Vodafone Americas Foundation, and previously received funding from the mHealth Alliance.

2. STD testing smartphone attachment

Columbia University researchers have created a dongle (an attachment with a specific software) that can plug into Androids or iPhones and conduct tests for HIV and syphilis in about 15 minutes. The attachment costs $34 to manufacture, unlike the current method of conducting these tests in labs which can cost nearly $18,000. The dongle was recently tested in Rwanda on 96 patients and is still under development to improve its accuracy before doing a bigger trial run.

3. Ultrasound attachment for smartphones

Photo source: MobiSante

Seeing how an infant is developing during pregnancy allows any dangers to mother and baby to be addressed at an early stage, and is important to reducing mortalities related to pregnancy and birth. Urban hospitals may be equipped to provide ultrasound services to pregnant women, but it is difficult to extend these services to rural communities. To make ultrasound imaging accessible to everyone, MobiSante, Inc, an imaging technology company has developed a “smartphone based ultrasound device that allows health workers to perform ultrasounds anywhere and share the images via secure Wi-Fi, cellular networks, or USB.” With this attachment, the benefits of ultrasound services can be put in the hands of community health workers in even the most remote clinics.

4. Sensory patch for remote patient monitoring

Photo source: Mashable

USAID recently launched the ‘Grand Challenge’ calling for innovative approaches in the fight against the ongoing Ebola crisis. One of the two innovations unveiled at SXSW ‘15 is the multisense memory patch or Smart Band-Aid. It’s a flexible patch that takes a patient’s baseline vitals and measures the changes from the baseline remotely. The vitals can be measured from outside the hot zone, or area containing active ebola cases, as the patch uses a USB cable to transmit data (the final version will use Bluetooth). With 7 – 10 hours of battery life, it costs $100 and is disposable. Wendy Taylor, Director of the USAID Center for Accelerating Innovation (pictured above), calls the smart band-aid a game changer!

5. Data Collection Necklace for Infant Vaccinations

Photo source: Khushi Baby

Developed to address the challenge rural clinicians and parents face in documenting children’s vaccination records, Khushi Baby stores children’s medical history in a digital necklace. After winning the Thorne Prize for Social Innovation in Health in 2014, this Yale University classroom project has become an organization and has conducted a successful field test in the village of Mada Daag, India. When vaccinations are administered, the healthcare worker can scan the necklace with their Khushi Baby app on their smartphone to transfer vaccination data to the necklace. The data is also automatically uploaded to the cloud once the healthcare worker returns to the clinic. Parents then receive automatic voice calls reminding them about vaccination clinics and during their next visit, the healthcare worker simply scans the necklace of the baby to see which vaccines are due.

As amazing as mobile phones and these new attachments and wearables are in global health, these new technologies also raise important issues. For example, when it comes to wearables, battery life can be an issue. Erica Kochi, a senior advisor at UNICEF noted that internet connectivity has beat electricity to many rural parts of the world, so access to electricity may still be minimal or non-existent in parts of the world where wearable tech can help. While finding better ways to collect more data is vital in healthcare, data privacy and security is increasingly becoming an important concern as we are realizing that there is too much data to manage.

The overall issue of practicality is another concern. Are these innovative solutions practical, cost-effective, and cost-saving? These are the conversations we will be having in our upcoming mHealth online course. We will be discussing new mHealth approaches like the ones mentioned in this post among others. We have a great group enrolled already and will be hearing from guest experts from organizations like Medic Mobile, National Institutes of Health (NIH), D-Tree International, PATH, and more!

According to a recent report by Grand View Research, Inc., the global market for the mHealth (mobile health) industry will reach $42.12 billion dollars by year 2020. That same year, GSMA estimates that smartphone connections will reach 6 billion, fuelled by growth in the developing world and mobile broadband expansion. The mobile phone market, the largest and most profitable segment of the global device market, is expected to total 1.9 billion units in 2015 alone.

With these high expectations for mHealth and smartphone adoption, what are the biggest opportunities for this $42.12 billion market?

We discussed this topic when we held a panel discussion in partnership with General Assembly DC at their office in Washington, DC in November 2014. In a rare opportunity to combine both “healthies” and “techies” in one room, we gathered a panel including Arthur Sabintsev, lead mobile architect at ID.me and instructor of General Assembly DC’s Mobile Development classes and workshops; Jessica Taaffe, global health and science consultant and writer at the World Bank; and our own Kendra Keith, mobile health specialist; and TechChange CEO Nick Martin – both of whom have facilitated our popular online course on mHealth. During this hour-long panel, we discussed a wide variety of topics on the mobile applications for public health.

Here are some of the highlights of “Mobile Development for Public Health” panel where the panelists shared insights that still ring true across the $42.12 billion dollar mHealth space.

1. mHealth can strengthen health systems

The need to strengthen health systems are the biggest challenges for public health, according to Jessica and Kendra, both of whom hold graduate degrees in microbiology and public health, respectively.

“The greatest opportunities for mHealth field and mobile developers focused on public health are in the public health sector, said Jessica. “The biggest public health issues are governance and figuring out the roles needed to fight infectious diseases and non-communicable diseases that are on the rise, especially as people are living longer.”

There are already several great examples of mHealth apps and programs that are strengthening health systems, including MAMA, MedAfrica, Dimagi, CommCare, and others.

2. mHealth can allow healthcare services to reach more people across the world

The ubiquity and diversity of mobile phones and their global usage will be a key driver of the mHealth industry reaching up to tens of billions of dollars, especially as GSMA estimates that there will be one billion unique mobile subscribers by 2020.

In their experience teaching the one of TechChange’s most popular online courses on mHealth, Nick and Kendra discussed the unique challenges of mHealth outside developed countries.

“Pay-as-you-go mobile phones are the most prominent form of mobiles in developing countries,” said Nick. “This model makes it more affordable for people to get internet access, and it will only get cheaper especially as players like Facebook and Google are ambitiously trying to get the entire world online.”

Clockwise from the top-left: TechChange CEO Nick Martin, mobile developer and General Assembly instructor Arthur Sabintsev, global health expert Jessica Taafe, and TechChange mobile specialist Kendra Keith.

3. Mobile development for health will become a hotter space for mobile developers through 2020

As a former nuclear scientist turned mobile developer himself, Arthur stressed how there are never enough mobile developers to meet demand in the current global market, much less the global mHealth market. Across the panel, everyone agreed that is it not easy to become a mobile developer, and to keep up with the quickly-evolving skill set demanded for building modern apps.

“Why aren’t there more developers building mHealth apps? Because it’s hard and time-consuming,” said Arthur. “There’s simply not enough time in a day to keep up with all the different standards for different operating systems, as well as all of their respective constant software updates. Although Android phones are used more in the developing world than iOS in western societies, there is a huge problem of Android fragmentation. What you tend to see more of now is that jobs in mobile development are mostly in the finance and advertising industries. If mHealth is truly going to grow to be worth $42.12 billion dollars, I’m excited to see more mobile dev jobs and incentives for this space to grow.”

So how do you incentivize mobile developers to build more mHealth apps for public health?

Nick mentioned that doing so will not be easy, given that mHealth/public health initiatives are often funded by governments or foundations that have procurement cycles. Though there are some initiatives such as the IBM Watson Venture Fund that has contributed to companies such as WellTok, funding long-term mHealth development has proven tough to sustain so far.

Another opportunity for mHealth will be in protecting the data collected in mHealth apps and programs. mHealth is fraught with mobile data security concerns in places where privacy policies are both well-established or barely existent.

What opportunities do you see for the growing mHealth global market? Let us know in the comments below, or tweet us @TechChange.

If you’re interested in learning more about the opportunities for mHealth, sign up now for our mHealth online course! The next round begins this Monday, 30 March 2015.