At the World Health Organization (WHO) Forum on “Onsite Monitoring and Mentoring (M&M)” held at the WHO country office in Manila on Friday, February 9, 2018, Phoebe Elizaga, mClinica’s health informatics lead, delivered a talk on innovations in eHealth technology that support M&M. Elizaga was joined by an official delegation from mClinica that included senior leaders Gigie Herrera, Rommel Claveria, and Diana Orolfo.
The purpose of the one-day event was to improve the monitoring and mentoring of front-line health workers, who study after study has shown to be critical to the quality of healthcare that patients receive. Traditional classroom trainings are not enough to develop M&M, and it was therefore important for both the public and private sectors to take action.
“It is therefore essential to have a dialogue on how to make on-site monitoring and mentoring more effective. The results of such a dialogue may help to support the government and its partners design enhanced policies and practices on M&M,” wrote the World Health Organization in its official invitation to mClinica.
In her thirty minute presentation before representatives from WHO Philippine Country Office, WHO Western Pacific Regional Office, Department of Health, USAID, and other organizations, Elizaga thus overviewed the main problem that pharmacists face in the Philippines: As a fragmented profession, they lack access to the kind of continual professional development that would ensure better M&M at the pharmacy level. mClinica thus wanted to address the pharmacy channel because it’s one of the least explored fields in health-tech, yet it stands to make the most impact on public health.
Elizaga spoke at length about what mClinica is doing to address M&M for pharmacists. The company’s flagship product, SwipeRx, enables pharmacists across the nation, even those in the most remote areas, to collaborate with one another, apply to job postings, and take continual professional development, all from the comfort of their smartphone.
The event also featured talks from Dr. Rajendra Yadav, the country medical officer of the World Health Organization, who facilitated the entire forum and gave his inputs throughout, and Edsel Maurice Salvana, a physician at the University of the Philippines, Manila, who shared his lessons from mentor-mentee relationships.
Elizaga was proud to have led the health-tech thrust on behalf of mClinica, amid such leaders from the public sector.
“To create true change in both M&M in particular and the healthcare field in general will require collaboration from stakeholders across the Philippines. I am thus proud to have participated in the dialogue today, and give a voice to mClinica’s efforts to transform healthcare in Asia through health-technology,” she said.
