A Global Health Virtual Open Mic will take place on 15 September, giving speakers from around the globe five minutes to share their insights into and experiences of digital health adoption. Emceed by Bobby Jefferson, Vice President and Global Head of Diversity, Equity, Engagement and Inclusion and formerly the Chief Technology Officer, DAI Global Health, the Open Mic is open to the global health community and beyond and is intended to create a knowledge-sharing platform on the challenges and opportunities of digital health integration.
Speakers so far include:
Angel Chelwa, Vice President of Operations, Healthy Learners, Zambia.
Darlene Irby, Executive Director, Digital Health, Pathfinder International, USA.
Darlene Irby has over 17 years of global experience in the creation, design, and implementation of international and national information technology programs. Ms. Irby has led in the implementation and deployment of digital health technologies as Principal and Co-Principal Investigator across several technical areas to include HIV, RMNCAH, RH/FP, Malaria, Global Health Security, and Economic Growth. She has worked across several countries in the deployment and implementation of digital health such as Cambodia, Guatemala, Ethiopia, Haiti, Indonesia, Liberia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Zambia, and Tanzania.
Prossie Muyingo, Community Health Worker, Ministry of Health Uganda, supported by Living Goods in Uganda.
Prossie is a community health worker in Mityana district, central Uganda. Since 2019, Prossie has been providing reproductive, maternal, and child health services to 120 households. From the onset of the pandemic, she has been playing a key role of providing reliable information about COVID to her community.
Dr. Sarah Kiptinness, Head of Medical Services, Penda Health, Kenya.
Sarah Kiptinness is a family physician who has served as a doctor in Kenya for the last 9 years. She has a wealth of experience working in the low-resource, private and public health sector in Kenya. Sarah is the Head of Medical Services for Penda Health overseeing 19 medical centres that serve over 30,000 patients per month. She has a great passion for high quality primary health care that is equitable, accessible and affordable to all Kenyans.
Sébastien Osterrieth, Monitoring & Evalatuion Associate for Integrate Health, an NGO in Togo that works to make quality primary healthcare accessible for all through Community Health Workers.
Sébastien joined Integrate Health in October 2019 to support the Monitoring, Evaluation and Quality Improvement team. In 2013, he achieved a Master’s degree in bioengineering at the Brussel University (Belgium) and started working as a pharmaceutical researcher for a Belgian company. Despite it being an interesting role, he eventually got tired of the everyday routine and wanted to discover new cultures, while also feeling concerned by “north-south” inequalities. He then left Belgium in 2016 to join the rural development program of the Belgian Development Agency in Benin (Enabel Benin), as the Manager of the Geographic Information System. He then moved to Togo early 2019 where he did both volunteering and consultancies for development programs before finally joining Integrate Health crew.
The Open Mic forms part of THINKMD’s work in documenting the current pathways to digital health adoption, as it aims to produce a series of resources within this knowledge sharing space. The first one will be a general and practical how-to-guide for digital health adoption, set to be launched in the coming months.
The Open Mic format is short, sharp and to-the-point with allocated speaker times and a section for audience Q&A. The sixty-minute virtual session, which is free of text-heavy slides and long-winded presentations, will take place on 15 September, 09h00 ET/15H00 CAT.