“Mozambique is a country with countless challenges in the health sector. It is an immense country, with 30 million inhabitants, where access to primary and specialist healthcare is not always easy. It was with this reality in mind, and also the shortage of human resources, that we developed this idea. Even from a distance, we can help many Mozambicans. Depending on the type of condition, it is possible to make diagnoses and follow patients remotely, in particular through telemedicine (online) consultations. Dr. Moz is an absolutely innovative tool in Mozambique, which will give Mozambicans the opportunity to access quality healthcare services and the information needed to choose an excellent professional with confidence. With the advantage that, through new technologies, we can reach the whole country.
Dr. Moz is a digital platform that aims to help any user to find health and wellbeing services more easily. It offers the following services:
• Search engine: This tool allows users to carry out their search according to their needs.
• Digital appointment booking system: Users can book an appointment with just one click, quickly and conveniently. Available times are displayed in “slots”, with the great advantage that bookings can be made from anywhere, at any time.
• Blood donor database: Dr. Moz has a database of blood donors, who can be notified at any time in cases of need.
• Telemedicine: It is the first platform to guarantee a telemedicine service in Mozambique, in which the patient can have a consultation in any specialty, from anywhere in the country, simply by having internet access.
• Subscription packages: It offers membership of different telemedicine consultation packages, at very affordable prices, as well as discounts at pharmacies and on clinical tests at leading establishments.
Our aim is to try to make this product available to as many people as possible, extending the concept across the country. We know it is a challenge, and we are here to overcome every challenge that arises and to adapt to different realities. As a virtual care tool, this device allows patients to access healthcare services without having to leave home. And this in itself is a very significant asset in a country like ours. Our aim is to provide help so that everyone can have easy access to health services. To ensure this, the app is available in an absolutely free version. Various public health problems, such as malaria and other infectious diseases, which make it hard to travel, can be dealt with at any moment and at any hour. We also have the example, so recent, of the Covid-19 pandemic. Patients can have a remote consultation, avoiding the possibility of contamination or spreading the virus.
It is the first platform to guarantee a telemedicine service in Mozambique, in which the patient can have a consultation in any specialty, from anywhere in the country
Dr. Moz has come to operate in the field of health and wellbeing and, because of the limitations of the digital mechanism itself – such as not being able to perform surgical operations –, it will provide general medicine services for more routine cases, and some advance work for surgical intervention services, to prevent the patient's clinical condition from worsening. There are certain levels of consultation that cannot be done by telemedicine, and these are automatically excluded from the platform, but when it comes to general medicine, we expect to have a high success rate.
In the context of low digital literacy in Mozambique, the idea is to set up and circulate fully equipped mobile digital kiosks, through which anyone can interact with their doctor. At these points there will be a trained technician to help users to use the platform, and even to translate from local languages into Portuguese. And as for the care of deaf patients who communicate through Mozambican sign language, the doctors will undergo training to reach them.
We are very happy with the interest from both patients and providers. The feedback they give us could not be better, and it drives us to grow this product even further. The number of users grows with every passing day. We have also noticed great interest in our product from insurers. Several entities are approaching us to be part of Dr. Moz, and this interest is very gratifying.
We intend to set up the mobile digital kiosks at various points around the country where access to health services is scarce. We know that a large part of the population still does not have access to the internet, so, to reach this group of people, we have mobile care units staffed by a technician who can help users through the clinical consultation process via telemedicine.
