Mobile health app makes a difference in sub-Saharan Africa

The EpiSurveyor downloadable software, developed by DataDyne with support from the U.N. Foundation and Vodafone Foundation, is designed to help health workers in remote areas collect and record essential health data. The Episurveyor beta version is under test in the "Malezi Bora" immunization campaign in Kenya.

The governments of Kenya and Senegal have shown strong interest by expanding the mHealth programs, committing new funds and embracing EpiSurveyor's transition onto mobile phones, which greatly expands the potential reach of this program, said Claire Thwaites, technology partnership head of the U.N. Foundation and the Vodafone Group Foundation.

Mobile technology like EpiSurveyor has the power to enable significant progress toward reaching the UN Millennium Development Goals relating to health and helping improve patient outcomes, she said.

"The application is developed in a way that you do not have to be tech-savvy to use it. The Web-based questionnaire development process is very easy to use," said Joel Selanikio, a director at DataDyne.

The application runs on any Internet-enabled phones, which retail at less than US$100. The application runs Java Mobile and requires all users to log on to the EpiSurveyor Web site to create the questionnaires or view any reports filed by colleagues.