A small team from Caradigm, including myself, traveled to a number of small communities around Tena, Ecuador and volunteered our services and expertise to Timmy Global Health. The organization provides direct medical assistance and healthcare services to low-resource communities in the developing world through short-term medical brigades. The goal is to facilitate long-term capacity development and strengthen local health systems.

Last year, volunteers from Caradigm and Microsoft implemented a lightweight electronic health record system across the villages in the Amazon jungle. With a gasoline generator powering a system of networked laptops and wireless router, the team was able to maintain a clinic-wide solution that was used by every volunteer to capture data in electronic formats. From capturing medical history, vital signs, laboratory reports, scribed physician notes, treatment orders, and dispensing instructions – we’re expecting to continue using this tool to provide a completely integrated system to help view longitudinal patient records and improve care quality in the region.

All of the work we all do in the healthcare industry – whether developing population health management systems or providing quality clinical care to patients – ultimately provides a foundation towards improving global health. Much of the same science and best practices that we have in the United States can be modified and applied to low resource communities – a strategy that has yielded great progress in advancing the global health agenda. We have reduced healthcare inequities, reduced child mortality, and eradicated diseases. However, there are still a number of challenges and opportunities to improve the efficiencies in our systems. This adventure helped me understand a different side of healthcare and a better perspective as to what sort of disparities continue to exist today.

I’ll be providing a recap of the trip in a future post, so stay tuned!