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Google Fights Ebola

Staff Writer | Google | November 16, 2014

While governments around the world were unsuccessfully trying to make up their minds about the best approach, sitting around and debating and discussing about the most valid ways to combat Ebola …Google came up to the plate in November and its CEO announced it would pledge $2 for every dollar donated through its website. They set up a specific URL onetoday.google.com/fightebola to explain this original social action and invite people worldwide to contribute to this worthwhile, timely cause...

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Mobile Technology for Community Health (MOTECH) Suite

Mobile Technology for Community Health (MOTECH) Suite is an open source enterprise software package designed by the Grameen Foundation to connect popular mHealth technologies to strengthen healthcare systems by streamlining patient data collection and improving patient engagement. MOTECH has the capacity to reach illiterate patient populations as well as patient populations in rural areas and works by connecting frontline worker systems such as CommCareHQ, eHealth systems such as OpenMRS and DHIS2, and communication systems such as IVR, SMS, and email to improve healthcare delivery. The MOTECH platform is designed to work effectively in low-resource settings, apply to a broad range of health domains, and meet the needs of large patient populations.

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MOTECH: How An Open Source SMS Medical Platform Is Improving Patient Engagement and Reaching Underserved Populations in Developing Nations

Implementation of the MOTECH Suite is spreading rapidly among government health services and humanitarian organizations that address the health of potentially vulnerable or at-risk populations across the globe. As an open source solution, MOTECH affords a number of advantages for health services, particularly in low resource areas of the world. Organizations or individuals who work with software solutions to healthcare-related humanitarian issues will need to know what MOTECH is, how it works, and how it might be used to improve the health of various populations...

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Ok Chatbot: What Is Your Value for Humanitarians?

Emily Aiken and Joseph Agoada | ICT Works | July 20, 2017

Whether or not you are aware of it, you have probably interacted with a chatbot – whether checking your finances, making a travel reservation, or even ordering a pizza. But what opportunities exist to use chatbots to assist humanitarians and development practitioners? Chatbots are conversational computer programs that can read message questions, interpret responses, and perform actions or make decisions, without any assistance from a live person on the other end...

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OpenMRS Welcomes with Open Arms

Suranga Kasthurirathne | Open Source at Google | October 27, 2011

Recently, I had the rare privilege of attending the annual Implementers meeting of OpenMRS, my Google Summer of Code mentoring organization. Thanks largely to the conference sponsorship by Google, OpenMRS was able to fund my week-long visit to Kigali, Rwanda. Read More »

Our Modern Toolkit: Free and Open Source Tools for Social Impact

Staff Writer | InSTEDD | March 14, 2012

At InSTEDD, we have been working to make the world a place where individuals, families and communities thrive, regardless of their geography, income levels or culture. We recognize that when dealing with issues around health, safety and development, there are many obstacles and challenges that we must overcome in order to make a meaningful social impact. Read More »

Redesigning International Disaster Reponse, Part 4: Current Innovation

Dave Seliger | Core 77 | November 23, 2011

Founded in 2008, Ushahidi was created as a website platform to track events in the wake of Kenya's controversial presidential election by geolocating first-hand accounts of violence in Google Maps. Ushahidi made headlines after it was implemented during the Haiti Earthquakes to track emergencies, public health problems and other hazards. The platform represents a shift towards responders relying on on-the-ground, up-to-the-minute, crowd-sourced information.

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