Smart’s health innovation nominated for international award

CEBU, Philippines - An electronic system created by Smart Communications to improve the delivery of public health services has been shortlisted for an international award.

SHINE OS+ (Secured Health Information Network and Exchange) is nominated in the Innovation in mHealth category of the Meffys Awards 2016, organized by the Mobile Ecosystem Forum. This is a global trade body established in 2000 to help address issues in the mobile ecosystem.

The winner will be named in an awarding ceremony in London on December 1.

SHINE OS+ is an electronic medical record system which can record patient information, remind patients of their appointments and medication via text message, and refer patients to other service delivery networks.

It also reports health information summaries to the Department of Health and Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth), enabling faster processing of e-claims and generation of real-time health statistics.

The system, which has 116,000 patient records, is maintained by the Ateneo Java Wireless Competency Center.

SHINE OS+ replaces the manual filing of patient records, which can lead to medical errors when the doctor’s handwriting is misinterpreted. Physical records can also be damaged or lost during disasters. Moreover, manually locating patient records is time-consuming.

Currently, 38 rural health units, seven private health facilities, and seven hospitals are subscribed to SHINE OS+.

A smart offer free trainings to public health workers, and has opened up the system to application developers so they can create additional features. So far, these developers have created add-ons such as an electronic prescription module, a disease-tracking and monitoring plugin, and a SHINE OS+ mobile app for Android and iOS devices.

SHINE OS+ is one of Smart’s efforts to use technology for the development of different social sectors such as health. The project has won several international and local awards, such as the Best Emerging Market Initiative at the 2012 Asia Communication Awards in Singapore, and Best Community Telecom Project at the 2012 Telecom Asia Awards in Thailand.   (FREEMAN)