CS Student Creates Efficiency Application for Ethiopian Hospitals
Photo Credit: Alice Cheung Photography
Courtesy of Nuhamin Minda
When Nuhamin Minda’s quarantine period stretched on far longer than the initial two weeks mandated by the Ethiopian government, she began to question the technology behind the country’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Minda, a computer science junior, had just made the trip back from Austin to her hometown of Addis Ababa when the government notified her of an additional testing period following the fourteen-day isolation.
According to Minda, she was not initially concerned with this delay because she knew the testing procedure only took 24 hours to complete. However, as the single 24-hour period turned into three days, Minda reached out to the government to find out the reason behind the postponement.
“They told me that while the test results only take 24 hours, the majority of the time and energy going into the government’s testing strategy had to do with matching these results to the correct patients,” said Minda.
Even after being given the go-ahead following three days of waiting, Minda recognized a fundamental issue in Ethiopia’s healthcare system.
“Some of my friends ended up waiting three weeks for their test results to be matched back to them. I realized that the government’s primarily analog approach to result-patient matching was drastically slowing down Ethiopia’s response to the pandemic,” Minda said.
The currently unnamed application provides a database for patient records and test results to be stored in. Every patient in the database is assigned a unique barcode which can be scanned by a device running the app. Once the barcode is scanned, all the patient’s data can be viewed on the device, including general patient information and test results.
As Minda explains it, the app brings the points of connection closer together in the process of communicating test results between patients, doctors, and the government. Currently, doctors need to have physical access to a patient’s test results and then deliver these results to both their patients and the government either physically, by email, or by phone, depending on the government’s preference. With Minda’s app, they would be able to send the information to both parties instantaneously and without any chance of human error.
One important component of the app is its accessibility. “I wanted people to be able to use the app on a widely available and accessible device such as a smartphone. Because so many people own smartphones, the benefits of the app can be enjoyed by an extremely large range of Ethiopia’s population,” said Minda.
Although she was inspired to create the app by issues Ethiopia faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, Minda also recognizes the impact such technology could have on how the nation’s healthcare system deals with medical crises for years to come.
“A lot of public hospitals in Ethiopia still carry out medical transactions using physical files,” she said. “Adopting a system of virtual record transactions with patient databases would greatly improve the general efficiency and accuracy of our healthcare system.”
Regarding the immediate future of her project, Minda hopes to receive feedback from hospitals that agree to test her app and make improvements accordingly before issuing an official release.
“I really want to know what possible clients think of my app, from its interface and design to the features that it includes. The app is designed for accessible use in hospitals, so I want to make sure that the people who will be using the app are satisfied with it,” Minda said.
As for the long term, Minda hopes to expand the use of her app into all of Ethiopia’s hospitals, using her technological prowess to provide rapid medical care to all of those who need it across her country.