Patients waiting for doctors at a public health Clinic in rural India.
Film about absenteeism of rural doctors and ICT solutions to this problem produced for a the Indo-Dutch Project Management Society.
As a country, India made its own decision that healthcare is a human right for all its citizens, but healthcare worker absenteeism has emerged as a major obstacle to making that vision become a reality. One major reason doctors often fail to show up is because the penalties of absence are very little consequence—Doctors still get paid and record keeping is unreliable.
The Indo-Dutch Project Management Society (IDPMS) compiled data on the problem and built an easy-to-use SMS/online platform for citizens to report and monitor absenteeism. What’s groundbreaking isn’t the solution itself, but the process by which it emerged—a local organization studied the issue, identified a tool that could help address it, and did so with the benefit of bouncing around ideas with peer groups with similar goals.
Watch the film here