Launch of pilot on Ocean Road Cancer Institute

We are happy to announce that in July 2024 we have launched a pilot on Ocean Road Cancer Institute (ORCI) in Dodoma, Tanzania. ORCI is the largest cancer hospital in Tanzania and the region. The hospital serves more than 50,000 patients and over 15,000 clients in outreach programs in the Tanzania regions.

Our co-founder and CEO Thomas Ahlmann-Liisberg are visiting Ocean Road Cancer Institute this week. He is meeting with Dr Crispin Kahesa (Director Cancer Prevention Services at ORCI), Dr Ninael Terevael and Project Assistant Emmanuel Sumari from My Personal Health Bank team in Tanzania.

Purpose of the pilot

Our project's primary objective is to validate our innovative healthcare solution and gain insights into the market framework conditions necessary for a successful launch in Sub-Saharan Africa, beginning with Tanzania. By partnering with ORCI in Tanzania, the pilot will provide a real-world testing ground for our solution. This collaboration not only allows us to validate and refine our digital health platform but also positions us to make a significant impact in the field of non-communicable diseases (NCDS), such as cancer. Addo et al. (2024) writes that “In Africa, more than one-third of annual deaths are due to NCDs”. This tragic statistic motivate us to gain knowledge on how our My Personal Health Bank web-application can contribute in the fight against NCDs in Africa.

ORCI will actively engage in the pilot, implementing our solution and collecting knowledge from both patients and clinicians. The pilot will last for 6 months, involving clinicians, nurses, management etc. to secure a brod implementation and support of the project.

Our end goal is to lay the ground for further roll-out in Tanzania and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Funding

The pilot has been made possible by a grant from INNOWWIDE (Eureka Network). Innowwide is funded by the European Union.​ It supports innovative SMEs with the purpose “to assess the viability of (…) commercial or research ambitions for internationalisation in a target country”. ​The focus is “market feasibility projects for (…) innovative solutions over a six-month period, working with local organisations based in (…) selected target country (in Africa, Americas, Asia or Oceania) (Eureka Network 2024). As this purpose aligns with our cooperation with ORCI, we have been selected to receive funding.

Thank you for believing in us.