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Sibongile Maruta Herald Reporter
Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) have played a central role in accelerating the universalisation of healthcare service in Zimbabwe through the e-network tele-medicine platform.

The telemedicine project is a partnership between the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), to improve access and delivery of medical services to remote and rural areas.

Potraz director for postal and courier services Mr Kennedy Dawera told delegates at an ICT conference at the United Nations Information Centre yesterday that the platform provided a new medium for information dissemination for interaction and collaboration among institutions, health professionals, health providers and the public.

“ICTs play a pivotal role in the growth of an economy as services are now used in almost all sectors of the economy, ranging from commerce, agriculture, health and education among others,” he said.

“The e-health is a pilot project called telemedicine. It has been funded by the Universal Services Fund, which falls under Potraz. In the two districts of Nyanga and Chimanimani, we set up equipment at six clinics in remote areas.

“This will enable the clinics to consult a trained doctor at a district hospital via the system without the patient having to travel to the referral hospital. It will be like a face-to-face interaction. The patient will only need to travel to see a doctor from the clinic if an operation is needed.

“The project is not yet complete and there is still more to be done. There is going to be a training workshop for those that are running with e-health and telemedicine.”

ITU representative for Southern Africa Ms Chali Tumelo said the e-health strategy had improved the delivery of medical services.

“We introduced the e-health some years back, and normally a patient goes to see the doctor, but we are saying the patient does not need to be in the same room as the doctor,” she said.

“ We have provided a high quality state of the art equipment that will bring a distant patient to the doctor,” she said