E-HEALTH NEPAL

E-Health – Under the partnership of UNICEF/Nepal and Golden Community. This programme consists of two parts to improve delivery of health service using eHealth. The first part is about tele-consultation between health workers and the second part is about vaccination reminder services for early childhood vaccination.

The first part of the program is about development of tele-consultation mechanism to improve maternal, newborn and child health. According to Nepal MICS 2014, under-5 mortality rate was 40 in rural but 26 in urban. Similarly, more women received antenatal care from skilled providers in urban (93 per cent in urban and 65 per cent in rural). This programme will contribute to achieve health equity. Within the network between health workers, referral mechanism for the rural health workers and emergency health care service will be improved. In addition, health workers will receive technical support at a right time.

Regarding the second part, vaccination reminders will be sent to parents/caregivers to increase the childhood immunization coverage. Immunization is a proven and cost-effective tool against infectious diseases of newborns and children under 5 years of age.According to Nepal MICS 2014, 67 per cent of children aged 12-23 months and 66 per cent of children aged 24-35 months had received all recommended vaccinations by their first birthday. It means that over 30 per cent of children remained unvaccinated. SMS vaccination reminders could increase the childhood immunization coverage. According to Nepal Telecommunications Authority 2016, the rate of mobile subscription was 113.7%, which shows an opportunity to maximize the benefits of eHealth. In this program, parents/caregivers will receive SMS reminders before the due date for the children’s next vaccination. SMS reminders will encourage more mothers/caregivers to bring their children to immunization sessions on time.