Project EmpatIA: Local Impact, Global Reach
A blog by Alexis de Brouchoven, a Frontier Tech Hub Coach.
Explore learnings from our pilot, ‘EmpatIA — AI to enhance healthcare in remote areas of Peru'.
Health and inclusion represent two interlinked pillars of Project EmpatIA. These two elements encompass the philosophy of the pilot, and serve as common priority points for the British Embassy in Peru, Inavya and EsSalud (one of Peru’s Healthcare service providers).
The EmpatIA pilot is designed to offer opportunities to replicate, amplify, and scale across Peru and globally. Our pilot can be replicated with other hospitals within the EsSalud network, as well as in institutions like the Ministry of Health, and the private healthcare sector — through their clinics. (To learn more about Project EmpatIA, see our first post here)
While the size of the pilot can be maintained in replications, several elements within it –such as the targeted medical areas, the specific selected cities, or the main roles in the pilot- can be adapted to what implementing local institutions decide.
Project EmpatIA recently had the opportunity to showcase its Health and Inclusion solution on two occasions that we are excited to share with you:
Local Impact
Our pilot can support making EsSalud healthcare services more accessible for people in several regions in the short and middle term, as well as improving their overall quality in the long term. We aim to support the Peruvian healthcare system in developing opportunities and room for improvement.
On the inclusion side, our scope for the pilot aims to better integrate the populations in remote areas to the national healthcare systems, addressing several challenges that currently prevent them from doing so. With this, our project can also have a social impact in these communities, by reinforcing their trust in the public healthcare system, and enhancing the perception of the use of technology in healthcare, which many of these communities understand as a distant topic.
As part of Instituto de Evaluación e Investigación en Salud’s (IETSI) eighth anniversary, EsSalud organised an online webinar to support knowledge transfer of digital health technologies across the EsSalud national network. Over 200 attendees were present at the event, with numerous senior clinicians and managers among them. This provided an ideal opportunity to introduce the aims and objectives of Project EmpatIA, and to answer questions from the participants. The audience was well engaged and provided excellent feedback. Furthermore, it set the stage to create a network of EsSalud champions to support future roll-out of Project EmpatIA.
Global Reach
On the 1st February 2023, representatives from British Embassies in Latin America hosted a seminar at Arab Health. Inavya was invited to present its work in Latin America to serve as a case study for knowledge sharing and dissemination as detailed below.
The session shared information about Healthcare and Life Sciences markets/regulatory aspects in Latin America and the Caribbean, alongside experience and top tips from UK companies already exporting to the region.
James Bell and Maura Smyth installing freshly-charged cameras to use in another test
As in Photos (left to right)
DIT in LATAC — Juliana Caires
Colombia overview — Maria Perez
Mexico overview — Julio Evaristo
Panama overview — Paul Alba
Peru overview — Rodrigo Acevedo
Inavya was one of three British companies that was invited to present their work in Latin America. Representing Inavya, Michael Wilkinson provided an overview of Project EmpatIA and how Avatr technology is being used to support healthcare transformation in the region. He referenced ongoing Avatr work in Brazil with InCor Hospital and the Cancer Institute, and how work in Brazil is informing collaborative developments in Peru.
A key outcome of this event is that it started new conversations about collaboration. For example, Michael started discussions with interested parties to extend Project EmpatIA opportunities to support the healthcare sector in the region, particularly in Mexico.
If you’d like to dig in further…
📚 Read about the pilot’s first Sprint and their three key phases — “Project EmpatIA Starts”
📚 Explore Peru’s Health Ecosystem and the pilot’s next planned steps — “Project EmpatIA: Innovating within the Peru Ecosystem”
