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Issue There is much health-related innovation in developing countries but most of it does not move beyond the laboratory. Inventors lack the social capital needed to obtain financing, identify partners and develop patent and business strategies. Without this social capital, innovation will continue to stagnate. Solution This pilot project involved identifying locally developed technologies that…an intellectual property strategy and assisting the inventors to bringing the health product or service to market or to those in need. A process was developed to support local innovators who had created a health-enhancing technology, to bring their product or service to market or to those who could put them into use. The process aimed to provide an external assessment of the technology, its value to health promotion, its viability in comparison with existing and expected products and services, and an intellectual property strategy. Outcome While the processes provided the information needed, they were not able to attract a sufficient number of high-quality applications to have any product or service survive examination.

Issue Multi-drug-resistant strain bacterial infections cause serious and often fatal diseases for infants in developing countries. Many fatalities occur due to the inability to determine the correct antibiotic for the infection at the appropriate time. Solution The project explored the development and testing of an electrochemical sensor for rapid determination of antibiotic susceptibility. The aim …

HOPE is a unique model for cervical cancer screening that uses new technologies, such as molecular testing for HPV.  Women from the community are trained to share knowledge about cervical cancer with other women, and to promote self-collection of samples. While free screening will be provided to low-income women, for high-income women, marketing strategies and new channels of distribution will drive demand for testing,…

This intervention in low-resource areas of Brazil will focus on children 1 to 3 years old whose brain development is hindered by lack of adequate stimulation. The Steps Brain Booster Program enables caregivers to offer quality cognitive stimulation activities, through an integrated in-class coaching and recognition program, dynamic and easy-to-use lesson plans and state-of-the-art educational…musical instruments and differentiated art material, all within a public school’s budget. Conducted weekly in an integrated manner, the program helps form “building blocks” in the brain for improved cognitive function. The program delivery model is an innovation in itself, emphasizing ease-of-use and affordability, and applying a successful private sector model to the public sector.…

In Lima, Peru, researchers will demonstrate a standardized community-based screening and treatment program delivered by community health workers to 60 children (6 to 24 months old) at risk of neurodevelopmental delay (NDD).The community health workers will identify and treat at-risk children and assist their caregivers, addressing multi-level problems. The intervention includes: (1) coaching parents on how to stimulate their child’s to promote development, and (2) providing parents with social support and encouragement.The kids and their primary caregivers will be randomly assigned to one of three interventions: (1) monthly nutritional support alone; (2)nutritional support plus 3 months of the intervention in the home; or (3)nutritional support plus 3 months of…to be measured and evaluated: changes in child development and parenting; the child, caregiver, and household characteristics that predict who benefits most; how intervention should be delivered for maximum effect (one-on-one or group settings).Says project leader Leonid Lecca, “The vicious cycle of developmental delay and limited socioeconomic opportunity (manifested in poor academic performance and child labor)…

In an unprecedented effort, Kenya’s Ugunja Community Resource Center will empower community health workers in Western Kenya with field-tested, mobile phone software to individualize early child development care in the family home and monitor progress via the Internet.Calling it “the world's first mobile phone-based early childhood development software platform for low-resource settings,” project leader Aggey Omondi says the software suite will include "apps" for community health workers, for parents and for caregivers, offering practical advice, tools, educational aids and forms for assessing, fostering early childhood development, including cognitive development, nutritional support, management of common illnesses, and counseling on cognitive stimulation for parents and caregivers.Equipped with mobile phones carrying the software, 30 community health workers will serve 1500 households…

Anemia -- a low level of red blood cells causing a body’s reduced capacity to carry oxygen -- results from micronutrient deficiencies, most often iron.India has one of the highest rates of anemia globally: over 79% of children aged 6 to 8 months and 58% of the 26 million pregnant women each year. Some 17 million of these women have access to iron pills yet 11 million do not take them for the recommend time (adherence rate: 35%). Why? The pill is big and tastes metallic.Yet iron deficiency anemia dramatically affects the health of a pregnant woman and her…a 5 to 10 point deficit in IQ.”Part of the answer may be an iron-fortified biscuit for use by pregnant women, indistinguishable in taste from popular Indian biscuits.Coupled with marketing, project leaders say their new biscuit is more likely to be used by previously non-adherent pregnant women, and increase iron stores in newborns, “which translates…protected early brain development.”“After extensive consumer research, the nutrition team led by Dr A.V. Kurpad and the project collaborators, Violet Health Inc have developed several prototypes specifically designed with the tastes and preferences of pregnant women in India,” says project leader Dr. Pratibha Dwarkanath of St John’s Research Institute, unit of CBCI Society for Medical…

Issue More than 2.5 billion people lack access to basic sanitation, with more than a billion people living in urban slums, a figure expected to double by 2020. Traditional sanitation methods are not adapted to the current situation, since they often are part of large, complex infrastructural systems and rigid institutional processes. Solution Peepoo is…to demonstrate a reduced disease burden by using the Peepoo sanitation system in a number of schools. The study involved 37 schools using a four-armed, cluster-randomized trial design to measure the effectiveness of Peepoo sanitation and deworming, independently and in combination. The project also provided training in hygiene for children, teachers and parents. Of schools involved in the trial, fewer than one third always provided water for hand washing and had a pit latrine. Of the…has provided them with the possibility to present their results regarding the situation in urban slum schools to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology. The final follow-up analysis of the study (one year after the intervention) has not yet been completed. A large amount of data has been collected and will result in at…

As perinatal and neonatal care advances, more preterm babies are surviving and being discharged from neonatal intensive care units (NICU) to be cared for by parents. However, follow-up care for these high-risk babies is often not available or accessible in low- and middle-income countries, such as Vietnam. E-BabyCare is a virtual platform for follow-up care …

Issue According to the World Health Organization 2010 data, about 285 million people are visually impaired worldwide, with 80% of these cases being preventable through timely detection and intervention. Despite the recent strides made in ocular care, services are generally limited to the urban areas and do not reach the needy population in remote rural areas. It is difficult for poor patients from rural areas to attend eye care facilities in urban centres. This gap between the eye care providers and needy patients could be bridged by…