Building patient centric healthcare commons platform: Equity and Accessibility
Creating a patient-centric healthcare commons platform that bridges the gap between equity and accessibility, ensuring fair access to quality healthcare for all individuals
Today, I am announcing a pre-release draft for our upcoming solution roadmap on Github here on our pre-release page.
As of 2018, roughly 838,000 people died in India due to non-utilization of healthcare services.
Now, if we remove ourselves from the bigger concern of quality healthcare, this is a strong data point to differentiate from and objectively isolate the issue of underutilization of healthcare due to accessibility issues.
According to a new report, there are considerable differences in life expectancy among different groups, owing to inequalities in access to quality healthcare. Published yesterday, the report described its findings as an insight into the “social gradient in health.”
source: theswaddle.com, India’s Rich Outlive the Poor by 7.5 Years Due to Health Inequalities: Oxfam Report
For instance, the Oxfarm report mentioned in the swaddle article cited the shortage of tests, oxygen, and hospital beds in rural areas as compared to urban. This the equity gap.
I am going to argue that this inequity is perhaps, part corruption, but also part logistical issue and you can add your counter arguments in the comments to let me know otherwise.
You would ask, “Why are you writing about healthcare divide when you write about healthcare accessibility?”. My question to you is, what is the difference?
/ˈɛkwɪti/
Healthcare equity refers to the fair distribution of healthcare resources, services, and opportunities to achieve the highest possible level of health for all individuals, regardless of their socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, gender, geographic location, or other characteristics. It emphasizes removing barriers that lead to disparities in health outcomes and ensuring that everyone has a fair and just opportunity to attain their full health potential.
/əkˈses.ə.bəl/
Healthcare accessibility refers to the ease with which individuals can obtain healthcare services. It encompasses various factors such as the availability of healthcare facilities, the affordability of services, the convenience of locations, the availability of transportation, and the capacity of the healthcare system to meet the needs of the population.
I have written about equity in a somewhat passive manner in one of my earlier articles in our general newsletter when writing about Universal Healthcare Coverage here:
In short, I am asking how much of healthcare inaccessibility due to disparities in supply and distribution of care resources and services. Or are they not?
This goes deep and I will cover this further in our general newsletter. But here I'd like to talk about what we can do about it.
What is clear to me is we need a technological solution of sorts that:
Connects upstream suppliers to logistics to rural areas for care supplies
A way for distributed inventory management and analytics to assess seasonal forecasts on medical resources accessible to care administrators
Connecting the end user, i.e. patient, to this solution, regardless of what app or platform they are using. So it could be Practo or Remedo for appointments and availability or it could Tata 1mg or Apollo for blood collection and diagnostics services. It doesn't matter. I am not their ambassador nor am I promoting them.
(I do not profit from mentioned these names coming off the back of my head as far as this newsletter is concerned. They have not funded my effort.)
Can this be a game changer and solve accessibility challengers and indirectly resolve some of the dependent issues that spring up from healthcare inequity? We need an open and accountable metric for the commons so that they can leverage such services and make informed decision. This is why I am building in the open as I had mentioned in our general newsletter sometime back:
Today, I am announcing a pre-release draft for our upcoming solution roadmap on Github here on our pre-release page. This work is inspired by ONDC protocol to ensure we implement the API specifications not locked-in to any single vendor. In the coming weeks, I will be publishing our roadmap and details about the stakeholders involved and more on progress. Stay tuned!