Narrator [00:00:04]:

Welcome to Supply Chain Now, the voice of global supply chain. Supply Chain Now focuses on the best in the business for our worldwide audience, the people, the technologies, the best practices, and today's critical issues, the challenges, and opportunities. Stay tuned to hear from those making global business happen right here on Supply Chain Now.

Scott W. Luton [00:00:32]:

Hey, good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever you may be. Scott Luton and my dear friend, our special guest host, Jenny Froome with you right here on Supply Chain Now. Welcome to today's show. Jenny, how you doing today?

Jenny Froome [00:00:44]:

Doing really well and it's absolutely super to be back.

Scott W. Luton [00:00:48]:

Yes, back by popular demand. And as always, you've brought some rock and roll leaders and some dear friends. I can't wait to learn more as we continue our popular Supply Chain Leadership Across Africa series here at Supply Chain Now. So we've been. Jenny, as you know, we've been conducting this series for years now focused on the innovation and the leadership that can be found throughout the dozens of countries across the continent of Africa. And we're pleased to conduct today's episode in partnership with our friends at VillageReach, a powerful nonprofit that is transforming healthcare delivery to reach everyone, leaving no one behind. In fact, their critical work enables access to quality healthcare. Get this for almost 80 million people.

Scott W. Luton [00:01:33]:

Folks, you can learn more at villagereach.org so Jenny, outstanding show teed up here today. We're going to be discussing the critical role of the community healthcare worker. Folks, you may hear us reference CHW. Y'all know we love acronyms around here, Community healthcare workers, what that stands for. In fact, we're going to be talking a good bit about healthcare supply chain, including how critical it is to digitize healthcare initiatives everywhere. We're going to be talking about how digital supply chain tools can truly help strengthen the community healthcare supply chains. We're going to be learning important considerations before you create, adapt and deploy digital tools across your healthcare supply chain, which I bet will offer some universal advice to supply chains in any industry. So stay tuned for an incredible conversation with incredible people.

Scott W. Luton [00:02:24]:

Jenny. Should be a great show, huh?

Jenny Froome [00:02:26]:

Any story that VillageReach has to share is always incredible and always eye opening and always educational. So it's going to be great.

Scott W. Luton [00:02:34]:

I know eye opening a great way to describe it. So very consistent. Love these stories and conversations and expertise we uncover here, and I'm going to jump in. I'm going to introduce our guests here today. Edwin Mulwah, Director and Team Lead, Digital Solutions Global Technical Team with the rock and roll team over at VillageReach. Edwin, welcome in. How you doing?

Edwin Mulwah [00:02:58]:

I'm very well, Scott. Thank you for having me. And Jenny as well. It's a pleasure to be here and to represent VillageReach. And we keep on appreciating the collaboration and the work that we do together with Supply Chain Now and for you giving us visibility on the important work that you do. So happy to be here, looking forward to a good conversation.

Scott W. Luton [00:03:16]:

Well, I appreciate that and we're honored to do so and we admire what you all do at VillageReach. I tell you what, and it gets better, folks, because you have brought a fellow Supply chain leader, Derick Lung'aho, Acting Chief Programs Officer with Medic, where they build tools for people who care. That is a beautiful thing. Derick, great to see you here. How you doing?

Derick Lung'aho [00:03:39]:

I'm doing well and happy to be here and have this conversation with you and also converse with Edwin. We've met in the real world, so it's good to be here in a virtual setting at the same conversation.

Scott W. Luton [00:03:52]:

Okay, so Derick, that's kind of reverse. You're meeting them in person and meeting them secondarily, digitally. A lot of times in the last few years it's happened where we meet folks digitally and then in person. I like that, Derick. So Jenny, we've got an outstanding conversation teed up. But Jenny, you know where we like to start, right? With some fun warm up questions. And we've got quite a theme emerging today because we're going to be kind of focused on sons, right? And Derick, I'm going to start with you. We hear you might have a clone out there as you and your son look remarkably alike.

Scott W. Luton [00:04:26]:

And I got to ask you, tell us about that. But are your personalities clone like as well?

Derick Lung'aho [00:04:32]:

Well, I get feedback a lot on a remarkable resemblance whenever we visit places together. And there's this phrase that people keep on saying, like your son cannot get lost. Like once you see him, you know who the father is. And it's very easy to just return to sender. Your question is very interesting. Like, as I reflect on that, I think we do have an overlap in mannerisms where the interest is taken up similar to mine. There hasn't been any coaching in terms of what he should pick up. Also his personality is similar to mine. Like he's an outgoing introvert, so to speak.

Scott W. Luton [00:05:11]:

Okay, so a modeling outgoing introvert. It seems like all of our kids these days are technologists. Is your son a budding and aspiring technologist as well, Derick?

Derick Lung'aho [00:05:22]:

I believe so. I think if a tech enables him build games, he'll do it. He's now crazy about Roblox I don't know what those guys did but it's something that kids have just picked up.

Scott W. Luton [00:05:35]:

Hey, same, same for kids all around the world, Derick. My kids as well, especially my son Ben. So great to have you and sons are certainly a blessing. And speaking of sons, Edwin, I hear that you've got a couple of special connections with your two sons. Tell us more about that. Yeah.

Edwin Mulwah [00:05:54]:

Yes indeed Scott. So I have two sons, they're now 17 and 15. With the 17 year old I share names is Edwin Mulwa, Jr. And my 15 year old we share birthdays were born on the same day which is June 3rd. So that's very interesting for the people always ask me for their last born son. I mean how did you do that? Did you get into, did you do some mathematical formulas and do stuff to make sure you get the date pinpoint? And I'm like no, I just did my job and go did the rest. And I always tell people that's the best birthday she had. She has something to do with it and what she gave me the best birthday present I ever had up to now. I mean that's awesome.

Scott W. Luton [00:06:35]:

Yeah Edwin, I love that. And Jenny, yes. If anybody could plan same day birthdays it would be supply chain folks that can plan and make that happen. But

Jenny Froome [00:06:48]:

And I. And I have to tell you it's a super serendipitous date. It's my husband's birthday as well. So wow.

Derick Lung'aho [00:06:55]:

Happy birthday.

Jenny Froome [00:06:55]:

Lots of Geminis around.

Scott W. Luton [00:06:58]:

Blessed be the ties that bond for sure. And speaking of wonderful people, between Edwin's family and Derick's family and of course your family. Stu. Stu Froome. Tell us. Well Stu's up to Jenny.

Jenny Froome [00:07:10]:

Stu Froome. Well we got him in the end. So my son is now 25. My youngest son is 25 and he spent his life growing up around the SAPICS Annual Conference Supply Chain Management. Never was he going to get into it but we caught him. He's now working for the Circular Supply Chain network with the wonderful Deborah Dahl and lots of other fabulous colleagues and he's working to teach us all on how to develop circular supply chains so that we can try to be more sustainable in our supply chain management. Which is super exciting. Never thought I'd see the day but it's great to see.

Scott W. Luton [00:07:53]:

I love that Jenny. And we're of course big fans of Deborah and Stu. But circularity, we all got to embrace it in powerful new ways. That is certainly a big part of the path forward. So I think we're all probably kindred spirits in that regard. Okay, Derick, Edwin and Jenny, we got a lot to get into here today and we'll do this. I want to level set a bit right. We want to bring all of our audience, the smartest audience in all of global supply chain with us every step of the way here today.

Scott W. Luton [00:08:21]:

Edwin, I bet a lot of our audience members will recall some of your VillageReach peers that have joined us on earlier shows. But for our newer audience members may be new to VillageReach. So Edwin, if you would tell us briefly about what VillageReach does and a little bit about your role where you serve as again director and team lead, Digital Solutions on the global Technical team.

Edwin Mulwah [00:08:42]:

Thank you, Scott again for having me. So VillageReach is a global health non governmental organization that works primarily with governments, the private sector partners and communities to build responsive primary healthcare systems that deliver health information products and services to the most underreaching the community. When you talk about responsive primary healthcare Systems, they have three key attributes and we've seen this from almost 25 years of work that we've done in this space. They are available when they are needed, especially for the hard to reach communities. They adapt to changes in demand and they're able to absorb the shocks and stresses that may hit the healthcare system in the event we have inclement weather or pandemics or those kind of things. And they also routinely factor and respond to the needs and preferences of the underreached community. So involving the communities to ensure that they provide input on how the healthcare system can respond to their needs allows them to get the kind of services they need from the health system. From the amount of work we've done over the last almost 25 years now, we know that we are not going to be able to reach some of the key healthcare targets and save lives if you don't address inequities in access, especially for the most underreaching in the population.

Edwin Mulwah [00:10:08]:

So our goal now and our 2030 goal that we've set is to reduce inequities in access to quality primary healthcare among the most underreached communities through building these responsive primary healthcare systems. So in my role as director and team lead for the Digital Solutions Global Technical Team, I lead a global team that's responsible for a portfolio of digital health innovations that we co create with governments and other partners to strengthen health systems. I say co create because we don't sit in labs and develop systems and go to governments and say hey, here's a shiny tool that can solve your problems. We want governments to be involved from the Very beginning in developing these solutions so they can have ownership from the beginning and can allow them to take the ownership and scale them up when these solutions are ready to be deployed at national scale. So we've done a lot of work in digital health supply chains. We've done work in telehealth immunizations by building electronic invalidation record systems, sample referral systems and any other solutions that require the use of technology. Our team supports the organization to put those in place. The other thing that I do that is critical is I'm responsible for developing and sustaining working relationships with partners and vendors, especially technology platform providers, who are able to give solutions, whether they're open source or commercial, that can support the development of digital health systems tools that can be used to strengthen health systems.

Edwin Mulwah [00:11:42]:

So in a nutshell, that's what we do at VillageReach. That's what I do in my role.

Scott W. Luton [00:11:46]:

Love it. So a couple things there get you respond to. First off, folks, we got a lot of technology players that make up our global audience. If you want to get involved and fight the good fight, the noble mission that VillageReach's on, hey, reach out to Edwin and we'll make sure you all know how to do that at near the end of the episode. And then Jenny, we love alliteration around here and I love Edwin's response. Three key attributes. He was talking about a healthcare supply chain, available, adapt, absorb. And then the fourth one that I added based on his response there is they serve anybody and all.

Scott W. Luton [00:12:21]:

And I love that. So Jenny, you know village Reach. Well, Edwin, I think we all know after Edwin's response there, we are kind of more familiar with what they do each and every day, huh?

Jenny Froome [00:12:33]:

Yeah, yeah. You know, my first introduction to them was very much with the focus on last mile delivery, which is something that I think in Africa is terribly underestimated. And I think that what VillageReach has done over the years to educate people around the community health workers, which we're going. Who we're going to talk about in a bit. But just the magnitude of the work that is undertaken to get all those things to the right people at the right time in the right condition is astronomical really, when you take into account the lack of infrastructure.

Scott W. Luton [00:13:07]:

Yeah, we talked about the innovation on the front end of the show here today. And it's remarkable. The innovation, technology, just supply chain management practices, last mile that we've uncovered through a lot of our conversations here in this series, Jenny. So that's a great call out. Okay, so Derick, now that we've kind of rekindled Our fondness for the great work the VillageReach Edwin and the VillageReach team do. Medic is an organization on the move as well. So Derick, tell us briefly about Medic and your role there where you serve as acting Chief Programs Officer.

Derick Lung'aho [00:13:41]:

Thank you, Scott. Medic is a global nonprofit founded about 10 years ago that advances equitable care and strengthens global community health systems to achieve universal health coverage by building open source cost effective software. We partner governments, technical organizations and NGOs in this quest. Our software supports health workers as they deliver quality, timely, equitable care for everyone everywhere. We are currently the steward of the and primary contributor of the Community Health Toolkit. That's an open source software that has been built to develop to improve last mile healthcare delivery and to date the CHD Master Community Health Toolkit is deployed in 18 countries supporting 165,000 community health workers and has supported 172 million moments of care. Wow. We have a team of about 90 plus people dispersed across 20 countries.

Scott W. Luton [00:14:33]:

And Derick, I was doing a little. It is staggering. Jenny, that's a great word. Jenny always expands my vocabulary whenever she joins for these shows folks. But Derick, Derick, I was checking up on your background, doing the homework for the show and you've been in the technology space for quite some time so I bet you're quite the asset to the Medic team.

Derick Lung'aho [00:14:53]:

I want to believe so. I've had my fair share of involvement in building technology. I was doing it hands on and now supporting teams now build the right technology. So it's been a very interesting shift and great learning at the same time.

Scott W. Luton [00:15:08]:

Love that Derick. Okay, so I want to keep following up with you Derick here because I want you as we continue to level set a bit more. Why are community healthcare workers Again folks, CHW, you're going to hear us reference that acronym a lot. Why are they a critical health supply chain workforce in Africa?

Derick Lung'aho [00:15:26]:

I'd say CHWs are the unsung heroes of healthcare service delivery at community level. They have impacts in the following areas. I think one is improving accessibility of health services. They are selected from the communities they come from and they've built trust and that allows them to reach the most underserved and remote areas of the world. They deliver services for free or at very low cost, hence improving the cost effectiveness of health service delivery in those areas.

Scott W. Luton [00:15:57]:

All right, so Jenny, based on what Derick was just talking about, the critical health workforce, that is the army of CHWs that are serving across dozens of countries across Africa. Your thoughts here, Jenny?

Jenny Froome [00:16:12]:

100%. I always say that they're the backbone of the supply chain in the health space. And I can remember, I think one of the things also to add is that they are responsible for education, whether it's formal or informal. It's that education part that is so important. I went to a session where four community health workers were describing to us how they educate mothers to identify the stages of malaria. And you can't give them a leaflet, you can't talk to them maybe in the same language. So what you do is you mine and you mine the different types of the state of the symptoms at the various stages. And that sort of education, absolutely 100% goes on to save lives and then empowers mothers for generations to spot these sorts of important symptoms.

Jenny Froome [00:17:11]:

So they are absolutely critical. The work they, they do is incredible. And to Derick's point, they are the uns, often the unsung heroes in, in this profession.

Scott W. Luton [00:17:23]:

Jenny, well put. And you know, it is about driving systemic positive change rather than just, no pun intended, but kind of putting a band aid on things, it's driving systemic change. And that's kind of what I heard you speaking to there. Jenny, Edwin, why is it important to strengthen, I mean, it might be an obvious question with an obvious answer, but really speak to why is it important to strengthen community health supply chains.

Edwin Mulwah [00:17:52]:

So Scott, we know that community health supply chains, especially strong community health supply chains, are very essential because of the role that they play in ensuring that these underserved communities, especially the ones that are in rural remote areas, have consistent access to essential medicines and vaccines and other health products impact health outcomes. There are many resources I could give, but I could zero in on about four of them I think are very crucial. So number one is health outcomes. A reliable supply chain means that there'll be timely access to life saving medication, life saving vaccines and other medical supplies. And what this can do is significantly reduce mortality and morbidity rates, especially for diseases that are largely preventable and can be and can be addressed by people getting, especially children getting vaccines in the world right now people are talking about health equity. If you have community health supply chains that are strong, they help to bridge the gap between urban and rural healthcare accessibility. So when you do this, it means that people who in the rural areas will not be deprived of essential medical resources and that does promote health equity. The other thing I can think about is the impact it has on cost savings when you have a well managed supply chain.

Edwin Mulwah [00:19:14]:

Even not just even community supply chain, but general supply chain. We know that it reduces wastage, it improves storage and distribution and it also minimizes the costs that are associated with stockers and overstocking, right. This is very particularly important especially in low and middle income countries where resources are constrained and every dollar that is put into healthcare system really does matter. The one other thing that I could mention is the importance of end to end data and the visibility of that data and how it impacts decision making. If you have a well set up and a strong supply chain, typically these have as part of that setup and they include monitoring and reporting systems that generate a lot of good valuable data that can inform governments and other partners about consumption trends, inform about stock levels, disease outbreaks. So when you have good quality and readily available data then this data can help with evidence based decision making and it impacts things like resource allocation, the capacity of governments to respond to outbreaks that have been identified in the communities by these community health workers and things like that. So there are many other reasons why that's important but I think those four are key to why it's important to have strong community health supply chains.

Scott W. Luton [00:20:42]:

Everyone love it. And Jenny, pick up, picking up on that last one he mentioned, you know, the criticality of data visibility not just in our healthcare supply chains but everywhere. But you know one, one of the things he touched on there is how this end to end data visibility and exchange, not only can it help us optimize our healthcare supply chains which in and of itself are important, but how we gather information on healthcare and health and needs and solutions and statuses and of course that's what drives how we set up and manage and what our healthcare supply chains deliver to hit those health outcomes and power those health outcomes where he edwin started his response there. Jenna, your thoughts?

Jenny Froome [00:21:28]:

I was just going to say that I think that you know, for years and years and years everybody's been talking about data, everyone talks about analyzing data and it's the same thing that has happened in a lot of different parts of the supply chain since COVID individuals, simple people like me have understood why it's so critical. Up until now it was always something like oh, data, data, data. But now we understand that with the right data we can actually help possibly forecast future pandemics. We can be better prepared to manage them. We can know the vulnerable communities. All these things that I think people have taken for granted a lot over the years, organizations like VillageReach that have been trying to get that good quality data but not just get it to be able to do something with it. And that's the, that's one of the key things That I think people just don't realize, but we are realizing. And Covid was absolutely awful.

Jenny Froome [00:22:31]:

Nobody wants to go through any of it again. But like I keep saying, we learned so much from it and the ordinary public learned so much from it and learned so much about what people like Edwin and Derick do that we never knew they did.

Scott W. Luton [00:22:47]:

You know, going back to the first point you made there, Jenny, data is way too expensive to just accumulate it and not do anything with it. And is there any bigger waste to do it that so. Excellent point, Jenny. All right, so we're going to dive deeper here with Edwin and Derick and we got a whole bunch more to get to. I want to start with this. So we've got two digital experts with us here and digital experts are in demand when it comes to global supply chain, Right. All right, so diving in a little deeper on a whole bunch more here today.

Scott W. Luton [00:23:16]:

I wanna start with this, Edwin, what's the current status of digital health in Africa?

Edwin Mulwah [00:23:22]:

So, Scott, in Africa we are seeing rapid advancement of digital health now. And this is largely driven by the need to address, you know, systemic healthcare challenges. We are seeing an increase in the government is trying to expand access to healthcare and also a desire to improve health outcomes generally in the African continent. And some of the key developments that we are seeing now that's really taking off is adoption of things like telemedicine. We are seeing mobile health really becoming big through mobile health applications, electronic health records, the use of tech enabled diagnostic tools, and just overall health management information systems. So just to give a little bit of more context on that, if you look at telemedicine and because of the increase in the support through mobile health apps and Internet connectivity, as we know Africa has a relatively young population. The mobile phone penetration in Africa is generally pretty good. And because of this, telemedicine has become a critical tool for reaching patients.

Edwin Mulwah [00:24:36]:

Remote areas and countries like Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, we have seen a big increase in telemedicine platforms that offer remote consultations and health advice. And this really took off during the COVID pandemic with all the lockdowns and stuff like that. So you find that telepathically took off if you look at electronic health records. Many African countries are now transitioning from paper records to electronic health records with varying degrees of success. Some have done it very well at national level and some are still in pilot stages, some are still planning. But what's happening now, especially after the beginning of last year, the Africa CDC launched a digital transformation strategy. And because of the influence they have with member states. They're encouraging most countries in Africa to not just have digital health strategies, but to operationalize those digital health strategies.

Edwin Mulwah [00:25:26]:

They do have them, but they're sitting on shelves. But now we are seeing them actually taking action to operationalize those. So that is now contributing to countries now transitioning from paper to records to EHRs. And like I talked earlier about mobile phone penetration, we are seeing that using M health applications, you know, health education is being accessed more easily. People are getting appointment reminders, government is able to do monitoring more about health outcomes. For some of the innovations that are being put in place. We've seen largely in Africa, especially in the HIV vertical and through support from organization like pepfar, this has really accelerated the uptick and the adoption of digital tools. The other thing I talked about health management information systems that is getting traction.

Edwin Mulwah [00:26:18]:

The difference between electronic health records and health management information systems is that the latter looks at the overall health system. The former is dealing largely with patient records, but the health management information system now incorporates lab systems, the finance systems, the reporting, et cetera and does this at national and local level. So this is also gaining traction. Of course there are challenges like there's still a need to allow to make systems speak to each other better and because some of them are not always compatible to each other, but we are seeing traction in that area as well. And then lastly talking about the tech enabled digital tech diagnostics we are seeing now there's an increase in portable diagnostic tools that are some of which are even powered by AI that are allowing health workers to even go to the community to provide services like you know, CT scans or if managers need to go go for anti networks, they cannot do that. They need to get a scan done. Community health workers are either able to go and do that. The committee in countries that allow that to happen based on regulation.

Edwin Mulwah [00:27:26]:

But also it allows these tools to be cheaper and also be accessed by lower level health facilities that typically may not have access to others. If you have pregnant mothers that need to go for ANC services and they're not able to go to the community, they need to have a scan done. Then where regulations allow community health workers can go to the community and provide these services or even because they're now getting cheaper with the advent of technology facility lower level facilities that cannot sustain these big expensive diagnostic machines are able to use the portable ones and provide services to more people who are coming to the lower level facilities. So yeah, that is the current state. Of course it then come with the challenges that have to be Addressed, looking at infrastructure, sustainable funding that have to be addressed. But there's an interest in the community, among governments and also the donor community to help governments continue to adapt and utilize technology in sustainable health systems.

Scott W. Luton [00:28:37]:

That is quite an update on the current status of digital health in Africa. I really appreciate that, Edwin. And two quick things there before I switch over to Derick. Yeah, it's amazing to speak, speaking of innovation to see what the applications for mobile, cellular, smartphones and really cool things are doing in healthcare supply chain, the financial world, really across the African continent. And then secondly, systems talking with systems. Don't we all challenge or we're all challenged with that, no matter what sector you're in. That's a great call out there as well. All right, so Derick, Derick, I want to ask you what other benefits of digitizing health more broadly do you see?

Derick Lung'aho [00:29:15]:

I'd probably say digitalization is a great level in strengthening three things, accessibility. So with these apps where you can just self enroll or late to a facility or community health workers, healthcare is in your hands as a patient rather than it being mediated through either community or professional health workers. So it allows you to engage more deeply and really walk that journey of good health. Then it also helps streamline operations. So that's the efficiency bit. So when you're moving from paper to digital, you don't like digitize. You digitalize. You reimagine how the business processes would be in a digital era, like really, really, really derive those benefits in terms of quality.

Derick Lung'aho [00:30:03]:

Once you're collecting all this information, you can go back and see whether things are being delivered as they were intended. And you can iterate quickly than pre digital with this data. You also get to do a lot of research and innovation. So figure out how to target interventions to different patients, which brings up personalized medicine or precision public health innovation in terms of you don't need to go to a facility so the app in your hands can be your own virtual doctor so you can improve health seeking behavior for people and at the same time lower the burden of health service delivery at higher levels of the facility. And most of those issues get solved closer to the patient.

Scott W. Luton [00:30:50]:

We could probably be here all day talking about the benefits of digitalizing. I think I said it right. Health much more broadly. And Jenny, I'm pulling one out, the personalization, whether it's in Africa or personalized health elsewhere, just like we're seeing that in retail and putting other places, it's a powerful force. And then of course the ability to better identify and manage shortcoms and Opportunities in our healthcare supply chains, amongst many other things. Jenny, what did you hear there?

Jenny Froome [00:31:21]:

Health care is in your hands. I mean, that's exactly what I took away from that, was that. I think that's a really powerful statement. And that's something that's so empowering for so many people, particularly, I think, parents or people who are looking after elderly, you know, the sandwich generation that's looking after children and also worrying about parents or also the elderly or who are having to look after their grandchildren in many towns and places on the continent. I think it must give a real strength and take a burden off if you can have access to information from your cell phone. But the big thing always, that we always have to remember, and I think that's what people like Derick are working so hard to do, is to make it accessible without the Internet. And that's something that I think a lot of us take hugely for granted, that you can just dial up and access anything anywhere. This isn't the case in a lot of places.

Jenny Froome [00:32:27]:

And that's, for me, the real magic is being able to create access to that without or with limited technology, if that makes sense.

Scott W. Luton [00:32:40]:

It makes great sense. It makes great sense. And beautifully said. And Edwin, Derick and Jenny both are kind of speaking to this next question. I want to pose to you how these digital tools can address unique community health worker challenges in Africa. I think we heard probably some of that here. Your thoughts here, Edwin?

Edwin Mulwah [00:32:59]:

So before I get into that disappoint that Derick made, that I think is important, especially for the audience, the difference between digitization and digitalization, there's a stark difference there that's important to point out. So digitization is converting analog data into digital formats. If you scan a paper document in digital format or if you transcribe data from a paper system to a digital system so it's in digital format. That's digitization. Digitalization is where you apply technology to change processes and workflows. Manual processes, manual workflows, when you apply technology and when technology impacts the way the processes get more efficient, that's digitalization. So I thought it would be important to have to make that distinction because sometimes those words are used interchangeably, but they don't really mean the same thing.

Scott W. Luton [00:33:54]:

Edwin, I've been using those terms interchangeably for, I don't know, 17 years now. So I appreciate you pointing that out. That is a really important clarification there. And you're the first person to really kind of let. You and Derick are the first people to lay that out. So I really appreciate that so when we talk about these digital tools and addressing the beautiful noble mission that CHWs are on and some of the challenges they face there across Africa. Your thoughts?

Edwin Mulwah [00:34:23]:

Yeah. So it is true that community health workers have a number of challenges. Some of them are unique and you know, mainly because they have limited resources, logistics are challenging and you know, I can mention a few challenges of how these digital tools are coming into play. So for example, if you look at training and education and Jenny, you talked about this earlier on in the show, many community health workers have limited access to formal training and also for them to participate in ongoing education is difficult mainly because they may be in remote areas that have infrastructure challenges, et cetera. So digital tools will come in to offer mobile based training programs. You know, they could have video tutorials on their phones or they could have interactive modules that will allow them to access critical knowledge and skills anywhere where they are. And you know, even also get for those who may not have smartphones, they could get text messages periodically sent by the government and which has verified health information that keeps them up to date on disease guidelines, treatment protocols and other areas on health education. So that's one critical area.

Edwin Mulwah [00:35:30]:

The other part, and it's going back to the issue about end to end data visibility, helping to collect data in real time and to help and how that affects reporting. So collecting data manually is time consuming, it's prone to errors and it also leads to delays in reporting and also challenges in tracking health trends and outcomes in the community. So when you have mobile apps and these digital tools, it does help community health workers to quickly record the patient information for the community that they're serving. It can help them to track cases, it can help them to submit data in real time. Countries like Kenya and Liberia have implemented nation scale nationwide community health information systems. And that's what the CHT platform does, at least for Kenya. And when community health workers are out in the community providing services, they use these digital tools to collect data. And this goes to the national central database in real time.

Edwin Mulwah [00:36:30]:

So this helps to speed up reporting to also to health authorities. It also improves data accuracy because these systems have data quality checks built into them. And therefore governments have that end to end data visibility. They're able to respond faster to health outbreaks, they're able to address needs that community health workers may have. If you look at the case, the patient follow up and case management, community health workers typically serve a very large number of patients. And when they don't have adequate tools to record the services they're providing, it Provides difficulties in following up patients, especially the ones that have been referred to health facilities for continued care. Following them up becomes an issue. Dealing with paper systems.

Edwin Mulwah [00:37:11]:

So digital tools come in to allow community health workers to have patient histories. It can give them reminders for follow up to say, hey, there's a patient who's supposed to go to an appointment. Can you follow up with this patient so these patients can be better managed? And also can community health workers, because of these digitally enabled tools can help patients to better manage their health. The other two things I can mention quickly is about, just talk about supply chain here. Frequent stock outs of medicine and supplies at the community health worker level. Because paper systems don't really help them track their stocks very easily. And also the health system doesn't have that visibility. When you have these digital tools, it helps strengthen the supply chain system.

Edwin Mulwah [00:37:58]:

Because community health workers are able to report stock levels, they're able to order supplies, you can track deliveries. And then this data allows real time inventory tracking helps their facilities to be able to forecast better, help them to distribute resources better. If they can be able to have visibility on facilities that have lower stocks and others have excess stock. So they're able to redistribute. So that really helps ensure that the, you know, community health workers have adequate stocks at all times. And one other important thing, going back again to the education I was talking about initially, education for community health workers. But there's also education for the community, right? Community health workers play a very key role in educating the community on preventive healthcare and things like that. So when they have these devices, they are empowered to have information that they can use for educating the community.

Edwin Mulwah [00:38:50]:

They can use educational videos, they have infographics, interactive content that really allows them to disseminate important information easily to the communities that they work in and therefore improve the health education of the people that they serve.

Scott W. Luton [00:39:06]:

Outstanding, Edwin. I think one of the things, one of the themes I heard there in Edwin's response, Jenny, and I hope I get this right, digitalization powers digital tools. Digital tools power real time everything. And of course real time everything powers much more powerful outcomes. And that's better health outcomes is like the north star that we are, we are fighting so hard to deliver, right? Jenny, your thoughts on what Edwin just shared?

Jenny Froome [00:39:37]:

100%. Well, also, you know, you know me and you know the passion I have for education and education, not being textbooks and certificates and letters after your name, but being education that's practical and sustainable. And if these tools can provide that to these people working in these communities, then that's got to be one of the greatest, greatest gifts.

Scott W. Luton [00:40:03]:

That is right. Well said there, Jenny. All right, so Derick, let's talk about how digital supply chain tools can help strengthen the community supply chain and of course what goes parallel with that, which is a broader universal need, which is of course more data visibility is absolutely critical. Your thoughts are, Derick?

Derick Lung'aho [00:40:23]:

Thanks, Scott. I think as Eden mentioned, stockholders are quite big and that is exacerbated by a lack of access to data and visibility without data. So once that is improved, we'll get to learn what got used, where and what's needed where. I think that helps decision makers and policymakers to figure out the most efficient and effective way of distributing commodities. There's also improved accountability, so we get to learn who supplied who and with what. Without that visibility, it's hard to like really narrow in or zoning on that. So more broadly, with that information, you can strengthen analytics so you can forecast demand, know where, what's needed. You can detect outputs by looking at consumption trends.

Derick Lung'aho [00:41:14]:

You can prevent wastage by tracking goods that are almost expiring and redirect them to areas that need them the most. And you could see loopholes, at least without this visibility, there's a lot of losses that happened in the entire supply chain. So that visibility helps ensure that accountability across the entire system.

Scott W. Luton [00:41:37]:

And Derick, does analytics that we're seeing leveraged in so many different ways across global supply chain certainly, and global healthcare and the ability to, as you said, you know, detect those outbreaks earlier so we can move faster and be in position before perhaps, and I'm not a healthcare expert, but before they reach that proverbial tipping point and the need explodes, right. Am I following you? Is that Derick, is that right?

Derick Lung'aho [00:42:05]:

Definitely. If you start seeing an uptick in the use of RDTs or paracetamol, you could potentially start planning for malaria season or a lot of consumption of zinc could be some diarrheal outbreak. So they go hand in hand.

Scott W. Luton [00:42:24]:

Good stuff. Edwin, I want to shift gears here at this point because we've talked a lot about and we've level set a lot on the current status of digital health across Africa, the need for not just digitization, but optimizing digitalization of healthcare supply chains and some of what, when we get that right, some of the big advantages and big values, especially in this mission to deliver meaningful health outcomes for all of how digitalization powers that I can never say that daggone word. So Edwin, I want to shift gears because I want to ask you important considerations. You Were talking earlier about not just kind of bringing tools and platforms to the various players out there, but baking in important considerations as we create them, these digital tools for CHWs and what will help fuel adaption and probably also adoption for using the digital tools to get the outcomes that we're after. Edwin, tell us more about those important considerations there.

Edwin Mulwah [00:43:31]:

So thanks for that. Good question, Scott. Last year, on the sidelines of the Global Health Supply Chain Summit in Nairobi VillageReach working hand in hand with other partners, we had a side conversation. We had a side conversation, a workshop where we were discussing how we could strengthen community health supply chains with data visibility. How do we apply digital tools for community health workers. And you know, the room had very good representation from government. We had donors in the room, we had organizations that support governments in, you know, strengthening at least digitizing system and also generally strengthening health systems. And one of the conversations was what just the question that we've asked, what are these important considerations? And we zeroed down on four key things.

Edwin Mulwah [00:44:22]:

So the first one is governance, finance and policy. We need strong leadership and governance structures if you want to successfully deploy digital tools. Because when you are developing these tools and you want to deploy them, especially at scale, you have to work closely with governments and you need buy in from governments. You need to manage competing priorities. You need to ensure that these tools are aligning with relevant national strategies and policies. And that allows us to avoid duplication and siloed implementation of tools. So governance, finance and policy is really, really important. And for finance, also because resources are required, funding is required to really ensure that these are implemented as a state.

Edwin Mulwah [00:45:07]:

The other second thing that was important to consider is the user centered design. You find that the needs of communities vary within countries and between countries. If you look at a community within an urban area versus a community that's within a semi arid area, their needs are different. So involving the end users in developing these tools, involving the community in developing these tools, just to ensure that you are capturing their exact needs and preferences is important so that you can get tools that respond to what they need. And also at least culturally sensitive because different cultures have different sensitivities. So involving the community does help to ensure that these tools are relevant for them. The third one is aligning technology and processes. And this was really in the context of supply chain.

Edwin Mulwah [00:46:06]:

At community health level, we have existing standard operating procedures, we have existing workflows both at community and national levels. And these are governed by digital policies, strategies, standards, et cetera. So ensuring that these technologies are aligned with these existing Processes is going to be important because that allows now these tools to be able to collect the data that is useful and to ensure that whatever data is being collected or processes that are put in place are consistent with how the health system works and ensuring that they're actually able to meet their intended health outcomes because they are aligned with these processes that are being put in place. And of course we know, we do know that when you digitalize, you have the opportunity of improving these processes further. One last thing going back to again, education is the training and support. Community health workers need to have the right training, need to have the right support to be able to use these tools effectively. So you have to ensure that even when you are digitizing the community health workspace, you need to ensure that community health workers have the correct training. If there are already existing training programs for community health workers, we are finding now governments are starting to integrate digital health training within those training programs so that you are having a digitally enabled community health workforce.

Edwin Mulwah [00:47:31]:

So you know that the training and also putting mechanisms or continue to provide technical support to the community health workers is important to ensure that these systems get sustained after they've been implemented and scaled up nationally. So those are the four key areas that we zero down on.

Scott W. Luton [00:47:48]:

Edwin, very comprehensive. I really appreciate that. I want to call out two points and Jenny also gives you a chance to comment. I loved your final one there. Because if digitalization efforts are not sustainable, right, with ongoing support, so there's massive adoption, driving again outcomes and real change, then what are we doing, right? There are temporary band aids if we don't make it truly sustainable in that sense. And then secondly, I love your call out on point number two about user centered design, especially to meet the different needs, as you put it, within countries and between countries of our communities, really across Africa or anywhere else. And Jenny, we talk about that a lot, right? We all have, across the globe, we all have different customs and needs and traditions and preferences. And it's so important to build technologies for the communities that we're trying to serve.

Scott W. Luton [00:48:40]:

Jenna, your thoughts?

Jenny Froome [00:48:41]:

100%. I mean, that was going to be my takeout was the cultural sensitivity part that I think it's all very well. We're talking about one size does not and cannot fit all. So it has to. You almost have to start with the community before you can do the development. And it's understanding that what might work in, and I'm going to be really high level, but what might work in Kenya is not going to work in Senegal or even one county in Kenya. It's not going to work in a different county. And that's the nuance that I think a lot of technological design sometimes fails to take into consideration.

Jenny Froome [00:49:22]:

Yes, we're not all the same.

Scott W. Luton [00:49:25]:

Not all the same at all. At all. I'm glad you and I and many others are in company. When I've got a seven syllable word, I'm gonna take it one syllable at a time. I heard that, Jenny. All right. And that's a great segue because there's lots of challenges. There's lots of challenges when it comes to adapting any sorts of technology and digital tools, no matter if you're in healthcare or if you're, you know, in retail or automotive or you name it.

Scott W. Luton [00:49:54]:

And I want to ask Derick and Edwin both to talk about some of the challenges that are encountered when it comes to adapting digital tools for community healthcare workers. What are some of those challenges and how can they be overcome? And Derick, if you'd address that first for us.

Derick Lung'aho [00:50:10]:

Yeah, thanks, Scott. I think the digitization versus digitalization is key in this particular question because you have to deeply understand what the goals are, why technology has been introduced in that context. So reimagining the world in which that tech adds value and then building the right solutions for the given context. Verticals like health, there's a lot of regulation that you need to be compl. Need to understand and be compliant with. I think Edwin covered a good chunk of this in his previous responses. Also, users are varied. I think in community health you find a lot of elderly, elderly folks providing that care.

Derick Lung'aho [00:51:02]:

So you need to take into account a lot of usability. So you find folks are farmers, fingers are a bit rough, might not quite work well with touchscreens. So how do you mitigate against such things? Also varying degrees of digital literacy. So some people, once they get enrolled the first time they're encountering smartphones. So, and as Eden mentioned, training would be key. So not just training in the domain of community health, but also in just digital more broadly and how to be productive using that education as well. You find most have either primary, lower primary education. So there needs to be how you articulate certain concepts, needs to be able to reach all and help them be effective in their work.

Derick Lung'aho [00:51:55]:

And HEV is very key in terms of really, really understanding them and delivering compelling solutions. Love, walk with him. He wants into design.

Scott W. Luton [00:52:07]:

Derick, love that because it's also, you.

Jenny Froome [00:52:10]:

Know, what's the saying, you can bring a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. And you know, you've got A great technology, you know, you've got something that's going to change the world, but if you've got people who just basically don't understand the fundamentals of technology, you've got to get over that barrier first. And I know that working he's going to kill me, but working with my husband, who is very technologically scared of a lot of it, it's like he knows what he can do but doesn't want to do the things that he can't do. So it is, it goes back to education every single time. No matter what age you are or where you're from, if you're not educated in how to use something, you will never be able to do it properly.

Scott W. Luton [00:52:58]:

Excellent point there. And you know, I want to call one thing out before we get Edwin to add to Derick's response there. And that's back with where Derick started, Jenny, the why the universal what are we doing and why are we doing that? And be able to effectively communicate the response there to any stakeholder that's involved. And that's so, so important. So Edwin, Derick started an incredible list and in fact he leveraged some of your previous responses as we were talking about some of the challenges when it comes to adapting digital tools and how we overcome them for our healthcare community, healthcare workers. What would you add to that, Edwin?

Edwin Mulwah [00:53:38]:

Thanks, Scott. So maybe limited access to Internet and electricity. So infrastructure challenges. You know, many, many rural and remote areas have inconsistent Internet connectivity and limited electricity, which can impact how efficiently they use digital tools. So you'll find that some of these tools, when they're being developed, they have an offline functionality that can allow the continued use of these devices or these apps offline. And then when they come back online, when the Internet reconnects or they go to a location where they have Internet access, they're able to synchronize their data. Electricity. You find that now we have solar powered chargers or devices that have very long battery life are being deployed for community health workers so that they can have devices they can use for longer periods of time.

Edwin Mulwah [00:54:30]:

Especially when you go to areas where it's not easy to get electricity or you have frequent blockers or things like that. The other thing that we are seeing is governments, through private partner, public partnerships with the private sector partners, they are expanding connectivity to certain areas. So you'll find that mobile network operators are being incentivized by government to expand their networks to areas so that people have that connectivity. So that that is helping to address some of the infrastructure challenges. You know, the Cost of these devices. The cost of data can be also an issue. You know, the cost of. And what happens now, what's happening now as part of public private partnership is governments and health organizations are working with, you know, this mobile network operators to provide low cost devices to health workers and also give them affordable data plans so that now community health workers will have their own specialized data bundle that is giving them access to data at a much, much lower cost.

Edwin Mulwah [00:55:32]:

And also there we have areas where, especially when you have limited resources, sometimes these devices are shared between a small group of community health workers. So that also helps with that. Resistant to technology. Some community health workers may be hesitant to adopt these new technologies. They'd rather use what they're used to. So Derick talked about trust earlier on. And what we are doing as we are engaging them is show the community health workers, show the communities what are some of the tangible effects of actually using digital tools. You're reducing your workload, you're improving patient outcomes, you're ensuring that you have commodities when and when you need them.

Edwin Mulwah [00:56:12]:

And through pilot projects, you're able to demonstrate that. And that really helps them be able to reduce the hesitancy on adopting these tools. Also, you'll find that if you have community health workers that are a bit tech savvy, you have them as digital champions that will help educate the community health workers and the community on the advantages of using or leveraging digital tools to support the work that they're doing. But also a tie to that is allowing and going back to the user center design, right? Allowing the community health workers to provide feedback on how the tools are used, whether they're useful to them, what can be changed to make them better to use, and et cetera. So that helps improve the adaptation of these tools by community health workers. One other thing that I think is, that's also tied to this is sometimes you have high turnover and retention of community health workers can be a challenge. You know, people do come and go. You've invested a lot of resources to train the community health workers, equip them with these tools.

Edwin Mulwah [00:57:13]:

So people are trying to develop concise and very standardized training programs that are easy to deliver so that if you have new community workers joining, you're reducing the learning curves by having at least training modules that are very quick and easy to deliver. You people are. Community health workers are being incentivized to continue performing these services and using these digital tools. When they get trained on the use of digital tools, some of them can get certification or stipends that allow them to continually use these tools and that helps to retain the community health workforce. So those are some of the challenges that we are also facing and some of the ways in which governments working with partners and donors are happy to.

Scott W. Luton [00:57:58]:

Address them with all. In light of all those challenges, blessed certainly are the digital champions that you referenced there. Edwin. The challenges are great and we got so many bridges to build to serve so many more folks and leave no one behind. Derick.

Derick Lung'aho [00:58:13]:

Okay, distillation has also been very siloed with each implementer bringing their own solution into the market and that you end up in a situation where a community health worker has 10 apps on the phone collecting data about the same patient in 10 different ways. So something that would really help, and a lot of governments are doing it, is introducing standardization and also in bringing alignment in the ecosystem. There's one roadmap, one set of priorities that everyone aligns to and then the introduction of standards and interoperabilities to ensure that there's harmonious, quite different tools and data can move across such that you do not need to duplicate that effort. So fewer apps and more focus on service delivery.

Scott W. Luton [00:59:11]:

Excellent point there. We've got a long way to go before we find optimal levels of harmony in our supply chains, whether healthcare or otherwise. And I'll tell you, that redundancy you call out, it is so detrimental and it wastes so many resources as we can solve the same things 20 times when we need to have that united aligned roadmap. Excellent points there Derick. I want to ask you, y'all have kind of spoken this a little bit, but existing digital tools that are being used specifically by community healthcare workers right now, name a few and why are they being used?

Derick Lung'aho [00:59:45]:

So over the top of my mind, the FAST is the Community Health Toolkit. This is the open source Medic stewarded technology. It's in use in Kenya, Uganda, Zanzibar, Mali, Turbo Poit to really power the digitalization of community health systems in those countries. It's offline, fast, multilingual and very customizable to fit the unique needs of country community health systems. The other that comes to mind is comcare. I think it had. I know it's used in India and Burkina Faso. Still the same space digitizing community health.

Derick Lung'aho [01:00:26]:

Whereas OpenSRP and why it's been used in Tanzania and Uganda, DHIS2 is available in many countries as a national reporting system, but they have functionality to support community health systems and I know Malawi and a few other countries are using it.

Scott W. Luton [01:00:43]:

Outstanding folks. If you want to learn more about any of Those digital tools and how they're designed and built. Make sure you get content information for both Derick and Edwin here at the end of today's episode. We've got a couple more questions though. Edwin, talk about the business advantage for a technology company to build or Adapt tools for CHWs out there.

Edwin Mulwah [01:01:08]:

There are advantages for technology companies to build these tools, and I can mention a few. So, for example, developing these tools for these companies can open the door to emerging markets in Africa, right? Because we are seeing that digital health is expanding and it's growing very rapidly. Like we spoke earlier then, the business advantage here is that if the technology companies establish an early presence in these regions, then they can build brand loyalty early. They can position themselves as leaders in the digital health space. And so when as governments and other partners continue investing in community health programs, then they get a good market share because they have established themselves early. There's opportunity. And as the demand for digital tools continue rising, especially for community health workers, and you're seeing that governments, donors and other international health organizations are increasing the funding and location for digital health initiatives. So this also provides opportunity for these companies to get other revenue streams from these foundations and these governments as well.

Edwin Mulwah [01:02:18]:

And this is important to support the work that they're doing in building these tools. So that's another one. The other thing I can think about is the amount of data that gets collected. These companies can use the insights that are obtained from this data that is collected to drive innovation in product development. That this data allows them to know what they need to improve the way they're doing things, improve the way their tools are working. And what this does overall, it makes this mobile applications or community health worker digital tools to perform better and to allow governments to collect even better data and, you know, resulting in better health outcomes. The other thing I can think about is preparing for future health crisis. When we have technology companies helping to build these tools for community health workers, it allows institutions where there needs to be a rapid deployment of technology in order to respond to health crisis.

Edwin Mulwah [01:03:23]:

You have a cholera outbreak, you have a pandemic, you have implement weather. Then these companies that have gotten into the market have proven that they can develop scalable digital tools. They get into high demand, they get called in to support governments to help respond to this crisis. And that creates more opportunities for rapid deployment. It brings in extra revenue for them. It allows them to play a critical role in emergency response. And that establish them, allows them to establish themselves as very key partners in global health resiliency. And that's the Important thing.

Edwin Mulwah [01:04:00]:

Last but not least, there's a big buzz about AI. Some of these companies are now dabbling into AI. They are able to because of the amount of data that gets generated. We do know that AI models require a lot of data to get trained, which helps now with predictive analytics and help to automate surveillance in low resource settings. So when they put these tools in the hands of community health workers so that they are able to collect this data right from the community, then companies that are leveraging AI have of course, with consent from governments, because governments do all this data, they are able to refine their AI models and therefore improve the tools that are being used by community health workers to provide healthcare to the community. So this also helps the health sector overall because now we are getting better tools, we are getting smarter tools that are helping the community health workers to be more empowered to provide real time or more timely access to health services. So those are some of the advantages I can think of for tech companies to get involved in this good stuff, Edwin.

Scott W. Luton [01:05:06]:

And it's going to be so intriguing to see artificial intelligence as it's continuing. I see new use cases every day, not just in supply chain, but healthcare and many other places. It'll be really interesting to see how our global healthcare community and its supply chain leverages AI. But also, Jenny, we're going to have to, because one of the things that Edwin pointed out is future health crises that we know are coming. The challenges today, what we know about are immense. But what's around the corner? Right, but Jenny, what'd you hear there from Edwin?

Jenny Froome [01:05:38]:

Yes, so what I heard in all of it is really we can be terribly clever and we can develop phenomenal software and we can do AI that is going to answer all the problems. But if you don't have access to your community and you don't have good communication and you don't educate, then all of it pretty much is worthless at this point in time. I think a time is going to come where maybe the human being is not going to be necessary. But all the while that on certainly in Africa, the human being is definitely integral to all those things. Community, communication and education. We've got to make sure we always focus on getting those bits right as well.

Scott W. Luton [01:06:23]:

Yes, Jenny, that's right. Who knows? Right around the corner there'll be digital clones that can do what we're doing here. And instead of the four of us, it's going to be our digital twins educate and informing our global audience. You never know. All right, in the home stretch here, Derick And Edwin and Jen, this has been a fascinating conversation and I really appreciate what y'all have brought here today. I want to ask you though, before we make sure folks and I connect with you both, let's talk about partners. In the earlier shows as part of our series here, Supply Chain Leadership Across Africa, we've talked about the criticality of the private and public sector partnerships, right.

Scott W. Luton [01:07:02]:

To help drive a bunch more health outcomes for all. So when you think about successfully deploying these digital tools that we've, we've spoken about for the last hour, especially for community healthcare workers, what partners do you need? Derick? Speak about some of the partners that are critical in that successful deployment of advanced digital tools.

Derick Lung'aho [01:07:24]:

Yeah, you'll need to align with government and ministers of health. They write the regulations that you need to be in compliance with. Without that, you likely not succeed. You'll hit a lot of roadblocks. You also need to partner a lot with technology companies who would bring the expertise in developing solutions, scalable solutions that are viable in hard to reach areas. I know the Internet is a luxury in most parts of Africa and in very remote areas. So that creativity in terms of developing solutions, designing them for that context, maintaining them for the long term. With digitalization, you're also collecting a lot of data.

Derick Lung'aho [01:08:09]:

So we need a lot of partnerships with data analytics firms who bring in machine learning, AI expertise, and also the skill to build very compelling dashboards to surface necessary insights for everyone in the health system for decision making. And last but not least, funders and foundations who need to invest in these initiatives. We're investing for the future and it's capital intensive, so we need all that support and also to help us track the impact of the interventions we are developing.

Scott W. Luton [01:08:47]:

Excellent, holistic list of partners that we need, Derick, to drive compliance, scalable, innovative, evolving, financially viable, and a whole bunch more a world of partners. Excellent stuff there, Derick. Edwin, what would you add to that list?

Edwin Mulwah [01:09:05]:

That's a good list from Derick and I could add maybe, you know, three or four more. I talked about this earlier. Telecommunications and mobile network operators, these guys are essentially putting the necessary infrastructure in place and ensuring that they can give community health workers subsidized data packages and expand the network coverage so these tools can actually work. So technology providers and telecommunication companies are key. We have also community based organizations. These community based organizations are local organizations that work directly within the communities served by community health workers. And they have the trust that because of the work that they've done, they have trust with the community health workers. So the communities that we work with.

Edwin Mulwah [01:09:47]:

So working with community based organizations is key because they can help drive usability of these tools. They can offer feedback on how these tools are aligning with local needs. They can support community workers to ensure that what they're offering is culturally and language sensitive, right. We need the funding organizations because these initiatives do require resources. So there are a lot of these funding, global funding organizations that play a very big role in providing grants, providing seed funding to organizations that can help and also governments that can help them actually implement these digital tools for community health workers. Academic institutions are important because of generating evidence and also research institutions. We need to generate evidence that show that these things actually work.

Edwin Mulwah [01:10:38]:

So conducting research and using an academia, very good in this. They are able to help us generate insights on what best practices can be utilized, assess the impact of tools and also basically educate, help put mechanisms in place, can help through evidence, help educate not just the governments and other health workers, but even the communities on the advantage of using these tools. I think one last thing that's important is the local community leaders and influencers. We have what we call the gatekeepers. These are the community leaders, these are the chiefs, these are the religious leaders, respected influencers in the community. These people are important. Especially if you are working in a place where you are sensing some hesitancy in the use or adaptation of these tools. Working closely with these community gatekeepers is important too ensure that we can have better or higher adoption of these tools at the community, but both by the community of workers, but also within the community itself.

Scott W. Luton [01:11:44]:

Jenny, I love one of the things that came out there emerged from Edwards response is the power of trust. And he, one of the things he touched on there is the community engagement organizations and entities. It's so important in building that trust between the providers and the technology with the folks we're trying to serve. And also you touched on at the end there, we all have to trust that these technologies and these approaches and these organizations, well they, they work and the results work. And that's a matter of trust building as well on so many different levels. But Jenny, we talk about all the time, you and I and all of our conversations, a lot of supply chain conversations. Trust moves mountains and there's very little that we can do without it. What your final thought there Jenny?

Jenny Froome [01:12:30]:

It really doesn't, going back to the point that Derick made earlier on in the discussion is that taking in the community, the communication, the education and I would add transparency, it's non duplicatory, it's got to be non duplicate. It's got to be one app, not 10 apps that all do the same thing, that people who are, who are leading these initiatives need to talk to each other so that we're not spending, we're not reinventing. The wheel, I think is what it boils down to.

Scott W. Luton [01:13:02]:

I'm with you. And that way we can, we can really make the most of our. Of, you know, any effort, any initiative, any organization, all has finite resources, at least all the ones I've met in my lifetime. And so how can we make the most with those finite resources? Especially most importantly, perhaps when we're. When we're talking about this noble mission of ensuring health care for all. So important. What an outstanding conversation. I wish we had a couple more hours because I know we're just scratching the tip of the iceberg here today, but I want to do this.

Scott W. Luton [01:13:34]:

I want to make sure folks know I connect with Derick and Edwin and I want to make sure we get Jenny's patented key takeaway, at least one of them from today's conversation. So I want to start with Derick. How can folks connect with you and the Medic team?

Derick Lung'aho [01:13:49]:

Well, via email, it's Derick. Edict.org Twitter. Derick Lung'aho. That's just my name without any special characters and LinkedIn as well. Just search for my name. I think I should be one of the very few searches.

Scott W. Luton [01:14:07]:

Outstanding. Derick Lung'aho, Acting Chief Programs Officer with Medic, where they build tools for people who care. I love that. Thanks for being with us, Derick.

Derick Lung'aho [01:14:17]:

Thank you for having me.

Scott W. Luton [01:14:19]:

You bet. I really enjoyed your perspective here today as the. What'd you put it? The outgoing introvert. That's a. That's, that's a phrase we can all relate to. Derick, Edwin, as always, we love to hear from the great things that the VillageReach team are up to. And thanks, by the way, for bringing Derick and Medic Perspective here today. Edwin, how can we connect with you and all the great things you're up to?

Edwin Mulwah [01:14:43]:

Thank you, Scott, and thank you, Jenny, for having us and thanks, Derick, for coming along for this great conversation. You know, you can go to our website, villagereach.org my email address is edwin.muluillagerich.org and just like Derick, you can find me on LinkedIn. If you search for Edwin Moolwa and VillageReach, those three words, I'm sure I'm going to pop up there with my smiley face. The other important way we can connect, we have the Global Digital Health Forum coming up the first week of December in Nairobi, Kenya. For the first time, it's being held out of the United States. We are glad as a country to host this great forum. VillageReach is going to be present. We are going to have a booth.

Edwin Mulwah [01:15:22]:

We are co hosting Happy hour with our friends Riki Digital Health. And so if you want to come and have a few cocktails and network with people in the space, then you're most welcome for the happy hour. So those are I think the three different ways that we can connect and looking forward to people reaching out and continue this conversation. Thank you so much for having us.

Scott W. Luton [01:15:43]:

Love that Edwin. And folks, if you're listening to this, before that event, reach out to Edwin. He'll tell let you know how to get involved. And if you're hearing this after that event, I bet Edwin will tell you all the key takeaways you missed. And by the way, I love how Jenny, if you heard that Jenny and Derick, Edwin put the emphasis on the happy and not the hour. I loved. I'm a change how I pronounce that. Edwin.

Scott W. Luton [01:16:06]:

I love that. Edwin Mulwa, director and team lead, Digital Solutions global technical team with the powerhouse team over there at VillageReach. So Edwin, thanks so much for being here.

Edwin Mulwah [01:16:16]:

Thank you for having me.

Scott W. Luton [01:16:18]:

You bet. Okay, Jenny Froome, the one and only. We got a lot of key takeaways here today, a ton of them. What's one of the key takeaways? Folks, gotta remember from what Derick and.

Jenny Froome [01:16:30]:

Edwin shared, it's gonna be my cheesy, cheesy, cheesy. But it's true. Team together, everyone achieves more. You can't do anything on your own and if you do, you go very slowly. But if you want to go faster, then do it together. And I think VillageReach is a great example of that and the partners that it chooses to work with and supply chain, Supply Chain Now is totally an example of it. So well done everybody.

Scott W. Luton [01:17:01]:

Well, hey, really appreciate the you say it's cheesy, but you act on that every single day. And we all appreciate that, Jenny Fr. And appreciate how you're connecting the world in so many different ways, including of course, the powerful healthcare subject matter experts that are serving an immense need. And folks, the need's not going away. In fact, the chat, you could probably argue the challenges are only going to get more complex and the need bigger. So it's really important that we all work together to meet the needs. So hey, to our audience, if you're in position to contribute resources to the critical mission that we've referenced here plenty of times, the noble critical mission that Village reaches on, we invite you to do just that. As we mentioned, on the front end, their efforts enable access to quality healthcare for almost 80 million people.

Scott W. Luton [01:17:48]:

Imagine that. And there's a lot more work to be done so you can join in and learn a lot more about that mission at VillageReach. Okay, we've got to leave it there here today. Want to thank this incredible panel, Derick, Edwin, and Jenny here today. But folks, as we sign off, you've got homework, right? If you're like me, I've got, I don't know, 18 pages of notes from what we heard here from Derick, Edwin, and Jenny. But the critical homework is you got to take one thing you heard here today and act on it, share it with your team, put it into practice within your supply chain or your or within your healthcare organization, right? We're all, we, we all have to have a lot more change. We've got to dry and drive.

Scott W. Luton [01:18:28]:

And it starts with that first step. So deeds, not words. With all that said, on behalf of the entire team here at Supply Chain Now, Scott Luton challenging you. Hey, do good, give forward, be the change that's needed. We'll see you next time right back here at Supply Chain Now. Thanks, everybody.

Narrator [01:18:45]:

Thanks for being a part of our Supply Chain Now community. Check out all of our programming at supplychainnow.com and make sure you subscribe to Supply Chain Now anywhere you listen to podcasts and Follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram. See you next time on Supply Chain Now.