BARCELONA — In limited-resource settings, mobile health projects face a twin challenge: Ensuring the data they collect from patients is not only easily accessible, but also secure — and they often need to manage this despite an absence of national regulation on data protection.
This is part of the challenge faced by the upSCALE platform in Mozambique, one of the first mHealth programs to be rolled out nationally in a low-income country, and which aims to strengthen community health delivery in underserved areas.
The platform includes phone and tablet-based apps for community health workers and their supervisors at health facilities. In essence, the apps facilitate stock management, and walk health workers through the registration, diagnosis, treatment, referral, and follow-up of patients — generating large amounts of sensitive health information along the way.