Proximie Partners with Jhpiego in New Initiative to Improve Obstetric Surgical Care
PR93570
LONDON, Dec. 9, 2021 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --
- The Obstetric Safe Surgery (OSS) Project in Kenya is funded by Johnson &
Johnson and to date has been implemented by Jhpiego as the lead organization,
in collaboration with County and National Ministries of Health and professional
associations.
- To support implementation moving forward, Proximie and Ariadne Labs have
formed a unique partnership with Jhpiego to integrate Jhpiego's best practices
in safe obstetric surgery with Proximie's state of the art technology platform
to leverage multi-sensory augmented reality tools.
- The OSS project, working closely with leadership from the Kenya Ministry of
Health, aims to address some of the key health systems challenges in the
maternal health space, specifically in the safety and quality of cesareans.
- Globally, approximately 810 women die every day from preventable causes
related to pregnancy and childbirth. In addition, around 6700 newborns die
every day, amounting to 47% of all under-5 deaths. Moreover, about 2 million
babies are stillborn every year, with over 40% occurring during labor.
- Life-saving or disability-averting treatment offered by surgery is
unavailable to 5 billion people, almost three quarters of the global
population, and this burden is disproportionately borne by those living in
Low-to-Middle-Income Countries (LMICs).
- Proximie's software will help virtually train and mentor surgical teams in
helping save the lives of mothers and newborns.
- The project is currently being implemented in Makueni County.
Proximie has teamed up with Jhpiego, a Johns Hopkins University affiliate, on a
safe surgery project in Kenya to layer in their unique software that allows
physicians anywhere in the world to virtually "scrub-in" and mentor colleagues
in real time.
Proximie has offered its technology to Jhpiego, a global health non-profit
working in 40-plus countries, to improve obstetric surgical care for women by
expanding and enhancing the learning and mentorship in Jhpiego's Obstetric Safe
Surgery project now underway in five hospitals in Makueni County. The goal of
the 22-month project is to support the government of Kenya's commitment to
reduce maternal and newborn deaths and obstetric-related injuries by improving
the quality of caesarean sections. Seventy-one percent of facility-based
maternal deaths in Kenya are associated with caesarean sections, and 9 out of
10 maternal deaths are linked to a lack of quality standardized care.
Funded by Johnson & Johnson, the Jhpiego-led project is grounded in a
health-systems approach, leveraging local expertise to build networks of care
to deliver safe and timely surgical obstetric care. The Proximie platform
offers the prospect of enhanced and expanded learning by obstetric surgical
teams.
Supporting the design and evaluation of the enhanced OSS project is Ariadne
Labs, a joint center for health systems innovation at Brigham and Women's
Hospital, and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Dr. Doris Mbithi, Medical Superintendent of the Mother and Child Hospital in
Makueni County and a partner on the OSS project, said the Jhpiego-Proximie
alliance will help surgeons perfect their skills and address issues that
arise.
"Sometimes things happen in the (operating) theatre and not all team members
remember the process," she said. "With the recordings, we can identify gaps and
rectify. I am also happy that at night, I have the possibility to support
remotely, either at my hospital or to help keep a potential referral at the sub
county hospital by consulting remotely."
Dr. John Varallo, Global Director Safe Surgery at Jhpiego, said the partnership
can increase the impact realized thus far: "By offering real-time, remote
surgical consultation, this project has the true potential of being a
game-changer in improving the safety and quality of surgical care in Kenya, and
in other countries where Jhpiego works. Collaborating with innovative thought
leaders at Proximie and Ariadne Labs, and continuing to work in close
partnership with the government of Kenya and the surgical teams on the ground,
our true champions of the Obstetric Safe Surgery work, we have the opportunity
to amplify the progress made in surgical safety and quality to date."
Dr. Nadine Hachach-Haram, CEO of Proximie, said she founded Proximie "on the
ethos that shared knowledge leads to accelerated learning and better patient
care," and the Obstetric Safe Surgery project embodies that.
"Our work with the local surgical teams on the ground in Kenya, and with
Jhpiego, and Ariadne Labs, is going to help democratize access to important
caesarean section surgical techniques and knowledge that would otherwise be
siloed due to geography or time," Hachach-Haram said. "Proximie is going to be
harnessed pre, intra and postoperatively in order to ensure women and their
babies have access to high-quality care, at a critical time. I have always
believed that collaboration is the cornerstone of driving meaningful change in
healthcare and the Obstetric Safe Surgery project will not just help to reduce
maternal and neonatal mortality, but hopefully provide a blueprint for others
to follow."
A leader in healthcare innovation and implementation, Ariadne Labs has
experience in designing and building in-country capacity and expertise to
implement digital innovations which will be leveraged to inform critical
discussions on sustainable digital health throughout Kenya, and beyond.
"We're pleased to collaborate with Proximie and Jhpiego to leverage our
experience in public health, frontline clinical care, and human-centered design
to improve the quality of surgical care that women and their newborns receive
as well as enhance the clinician experience," said Katherine Semrau, PhD, MPH,
Principal Investigator and Director of Ariadne Labs' BetterBirth program. "Our
aim at Ariadne Labs is to reduce suffering and save lives for people everywhere
-- whether in Boston, Nairobi, or Lucknow -- by developing scalable,
systems-level solutions. We look forward to supporting the measurement and
evaluation of this work, to ultimately improve the interventions and their
implementation."
Notes To Editors
You can follow the Project across social media channels with the hashtag
#ProjectSafeSurgery as well as on Medium Magazine The Link.
Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1705841/Proximie_1.jpg
Photo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1705842/Proximie_2.jpg
Source: Proximie
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