Health Database

This page is part of the Health project.

This page needs clean-up and editing for coherence, clarity, and completeness.

Please improve this article if you can.

Resources not yet tapped

• Port of the XTerm Medical Database
• Various relevant wikislices
• Hesperian Documents like "Where there is no Doctor"
• Relevant multimedia

Database and Activity Goals

• To provide a reference library for educational purposes
• To be a guide for first aid and treatment in emergency situations

All of the goals boil down to this one hope: to elongate and improve life

Expectations

• Will be helpful in situations where trained medical personnel are unavailable, overworked, or unreachable.
  • Not to be used in place of a doctor or other person trained in medicine

Modules

Tentative List

Please debate modifications/additions on the Discussion page

• Physiology
  • Parts of the Body
  • Body Systems/functions
• Epidemiology
  • "Germs"
  • Vectors
• First Aid
• Childhood Disease and Prevention
  • Childhood Diseases
  • Prevention
  • Mitigation/Treatment (as applicable)
  • Vaccines
• Sanitation/hygiene
  • Hand Washing
  • Other personal hygiene
  • Food Handling
  • Healthy Home
  • Clean Water
• Diet
• General Reference Texts

Info

• Each of these Modules, with corresponding submodules, will have to be created, localized and translated for each country and language.
• Some will need more localization than others. For example "hand washing" will need localization for urban, peri-urban, and rural areas, while "childhood disease and prevention" will need extensive localization for each area based on it most common childhood illnesses and best-of-breed prevention techniques.
• In addition to localization, each module will need to have appropriate material.
• If you are interested in coordinating one of these modules, please contact David Greisen.

Content types

We are looking for all sorts of health content for each module:

• Picture books/children's stories
• Simple computer games to encourage healthy behavior
• Other computer-based activities taking advantage of the laptop's interactive capabilities
• Educational animations (See also: Mentoring#Ideas)
• Activities that can be performed in "real life," such as science experiments, community projects
• Lesson plans for teachers
• Teacher education material
• Textbooks
• Reference books

Partners

Over the next several months we will be working to find health organizations that are willing to donate content to the OLPC library. As we confirm these organizations, they and their contributions will be listed under "Confirmed Partners." If you have an idea for a potential content partner, please list it, along with a brief description under "Suggested Partners."

Confirmed Partners

• Hesperian Foundation - Publisher of such books as "Where There is no Doctor", see Adapting Hesperian Books -- send us CDs containing In Design layouts for
  • WTND in English and Spanish
  • Water for Life
  • Sanitation and Cleanliness
  • Pesticides are Poison
• XTerm Medical Dictionary
  • Aurelian, creator of XTerm Medical Dictionary, has licensed the contents to OLPC

Suggested Partners

• Health Ministries of target countries Argentina, Brazil, Ethiopia, India, Libya, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Thailand, United States, Uruguay
  • Argentina - Ministerio de Salud de la Nación
  • Brazil - Ministério da Saúde
  • Libya - unkown
  • Nigeria - Federal Ministry of Health
  • Rwanda - unknown
  • Thailand - Ministry of Public Health
  • Uruguay - Ministerio de Salud Pública
  • Peru - Ministerio de Salud (MINSA)
• World Health Organization
  • WHO Africa
  • WHO SE Asia
  • Pan-American Health Organization
• Partners in Health
• Hesperian Foundation - Publisher of such books as "Where There is no Doctor"
  • Hesperian has been contacted by Pascal Scheffers
• Malaria Foundation International
• U.S. National Library of Medicine
• Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto - "We have lots of material" and high-level administrators there are interested in providing it to us. Similar interest from the Faculty of Dentistry (2007-05-16). Contact Mike Fletcher (mcfletch@vrplumber.com) for contact details.

Local organizations, both official and NGOs, will have a mixed set of materials targeting the local population, which presumably has already the linguistic and cultural factors incorporated, so that would be the first stop to source material. Sometimes you can find the dated material side by side with the latest ideas about health and education.

A general list of International Organizations and Foreign Government Agencies compiled by USA's FDA

• medecins sans frontieres [1]

Progress

• Ian Daniher has collected some diagnosis aids used by a local hospital.
• Ian Daniher has been corresponding with Aurelian, creator of XTerm Medical Dictionary, and he has graciously offered to license the database allow OLPC and direct affiliates access and an ability to freely distribute it.
• User:Pascal has started communication with the Hesperian Foundation, which provides elegantly written medical manuals to third world individuals.

Problems

• Legal liability, a hefty disclaimer may be needed.
• Doing this with limited medical background - can we find a doctor willing to help us out on this one?
• Testing - this will need plenty of testing to make sure everything is accurate and working before it is distributed
• Timeline - will likely take longer than will the TeleHealth Module to be completed
  • Can a basic version be completed in time to be distributed with the MP of the TeleHealth Module?