Smartphones to track TB patients

2011-03-24 13:01

Johannesburg - The government will make increasing use of technology such as smartphones and online maps in the fight against TB, the health department said.

A pilot project was being introduced in KwaZulu-Natal for health workers to use smartphones to collect patient information, said Claudio Marra of the University Research Corporation, an American NGO working with the department.

Google Earth would be used to locate patients' homes with the address the patients had given the health facility.

Then it would send a health worker with a smartphone, a phone with an electronic TB register in it, to the address, Marra said.

"When the health worker gets there he/she would be able to send all the patients' information immediately to the department's server."

The department would also use the opportunity to check on all the people the patient had come into contact with.

The homes of those still waiting for their results, and those on treatment, would be marked on the system. Marra said this would help centralise patient information, and link the data to their addresses.

The pilot project would be unveiled by Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi in Durban on Thursday.

- SAPA