As part of our dissemination plan, the Digital Health Payment Initiative and Research project (DHPI-R) project holds bi-monthly webinars where we share updates and discuss emerging findings from our ongoing studies in Sub-Saharan Africa. Our recent webinar conducted on the 10th of February, 2023, was a collaboration between Makerere University School of Public Health, and Compelling Works Malawi.
This was aimed at sharing implementation experiences of digital payments for healthcare workers in the recently concluded Polio immunization campaigns in Malawi and Uganda. Purposed to identify best practices in digital payments and stimulate reciprocal learning across countries.
The event attracted multisectoral stakeholders, including experts from the World Health Organization, the Ministries of Health and Finance, telecommunication entities, health researchers, and healthcare workers from Malawi and Uganda.
Several speakers including Patsy Kiconco from the World Health Organization Digital Health, Dr. Mike Nenani Chisema from the Ministry of Health Malawi, Dr. Kondwani Mamba from Mangochi District Council in Malawi, Dr. Alfred Driwale from the Uganda Expanded Programme on Immunisation, Ms. Hafsa Tembo from Uganda's Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, and Dr. Gilbert A. Mateeka, District Health Officer from Kabale district were featured.
Main highlights from the webinar discussions
The countries embarked on paying the Polio campaign healthcare workers digitally as mandated by their governments.
Digital payments are generally accepted by healthcare providers in both countries due to its promptness in making and receiving payments, safety, and transparency.
Some of the factors that facilitated the seamless implementation of digital payment systems during the polio vaccination included: political will, stakeholder engagement, and widespread coverage of internet and phone use mainly in the urban areas.
Associated implementation challenges are similar across the contexts, however, responses to the challenges differ across countries. Providing cross-learning opportunities.
Rural areas and hard-to-reach areas generally have inadequate access to the Internet and digital infrastructure and this may hinder their uptake of digital payment.
While the key takeaways provided a glimpse into the implementation of digital payment systems for campaign healthcare workers in Sub-Saharan Africa, readers can gain a more comprehensive understanding of the challenges and solutions by reading the full report on the webinar.
Click here to download the English version and here to download the French version.
Watch the full webinar here for more Passcode: v!mZ*g6q
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