Satellite 4 Digital Health to fast-track UN SDGs

Network Design for Permanent Hospital and Rural Clinic Locations with VSATs

As deployed at Aviation Medical Clinic and the immediate Gwazaye Community situated behind the Kaduna International Airport, Kaduna State, Nigeria.

Network Design for the Mobile Digital Health Service & as Emergency Response Facility for Disaster Recovery

We explored and created a mobile emergency response facility that can be quickly deployed to a disaster location and mobile Telemedicine Medical Service delivery at Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) Camps.

Medical Outreach using Satellite Network Terminal (VSAT) at Gwazaye Community Kaduna State in Northern Nigeria

VSAT terminal for reliable internet to provide Telemedicine services in remote and underserved locations such as Gwazaye community, Kaduna in Northern Nigeria.

Digital Health Training Workshop

A waiting area was also provided, which consisted of chairs arranged under pop up canopies to address the issue of over-crowding as well as disseminate useful information on epidemics, pandemics, HIV/AIDS prevention and control, pediatric care and treatment, prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT); counselling and testing and early warning indicators; malaria prevention and control information (use of insecticides, anti-mosquito nets, etc.); information on prevention, control and managing fire disasters, floods, etc.; and general community health programmes (how to create and maintain clean environments), as well as Ebola virus disease outbreak control. We also provide hands-on training for health workers on digital tools and data.

Telemedicine Services at New Kuchingoro Abuja (Federal Capital Territory) Internally Displaced Persons Camp, Nigeria.

Those living in displaced camps have inadequate access to health care services. Internally displaced women and children are globally the worst hit by the unavailability of healthcare services, with 87% of deaths in Internally Displaced Person (IDP) camps resulting from preventable illnesses. Our S4DH Research project deployed the NIGCOMSAT-1R Communications satellite to provide telemedicine services to patients and carry out a satellite-enabled telemedicine medical outreach at New Kuchingoro Abuja (Federal Capital Territory) Internally Displaced Persons Camp, Nigeria.

Medical Board Ethical Approval

Ethical Approval from Imo State University Teaching Hospital signalling the commencement of Telemedicine field trials after a series of evaluations of patient consent documents among others.

Telemedicine Outreach at Cottage Hospital Eket Ikpene Udo, Akwa-Ibom State in Southern Nigeria

The Cottage hospital is the only healthcare facility in the village, which is not enough for the large population of the dwellers of the village.

Telemedicine Outreach at Cottage Hospital Eket Ikpene Udo, Akwa-Ibom State in Southern Nigeria

One of the leading Gubernatorial Aspirant of Akwa Ibom State  and Now the Executive Governor; Pastor Umo Bassey Eno who is a native of Ikot Ekpene Udo  travelled over 100km from the capital city; Uyo to his village; the telemedicine medical outreach venue and had these to say…. “I have seen the impact of your medical outreach here today with doctors online attending to our people. I will deploy Digital Health Facilities across Akwa Ibom State if I assume leadership as Governor of Akwa-Ibom State.

17th Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 28 November 2022.

Presented Best practices and recommendations for digital inclusion through resilient infrastructure at 17th Internet Governance Forum in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia 28 November 2022. Also featured was outcomes from fifteen research teams, that were the winners of Connect2Recover’s research competition.The fifteen research reports focus on digital inclusion (in the areas of education, healthcare, jobs and employment, and affecting vulnerable groups) and the importance of digital resiliency, building from lessons learned from COVID-19. The rich diversity of research and case studies from 17 countries in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Americas and Arab States, would enrich and bring invaluable insight to IGF’s overarching theme of Resilient Internet for a shared sustainable and common future.

The ITU Connect2Recover Initiative Award Letter

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Award Letter for the ITU Connect2Recover Initiative for our Telemedicine Research Project.

Published Articles in Telemedicine

1.      "A review of telemedicine and its potential in developing countries," 8th International Conference on Mechatronics Engineering (ICOM 2022), Online Conference, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 2022, pp.32-40, doi: 10.1049/icp.2022.2261. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9964174 2.       "Overview of Satellite Communications and its Applications in Telemedicine for the underserved in Nigeria: A case study," 2022 International Conference on Electrical, Computer, Communications and  Mechatronics  Engineering  (ICECCME),  Maldives,  Maldives,  2022,  pp.  1-10,  doi:  10.1109/ICECCME55909.2022.9988286. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9988286 3.       "Internally  Displaced  Persons  (IDPs)  in  Nigeria:  An Overview  of  Health  Situation published by International Journal of Health, Safety and Environment (IJHSE). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366055703_Internally_Displaced_Persons_in_Abuja_An_Overview_Of_Health_Situation_and_Solution. 4.       "Digital  Health  Inclusion:  A  Pilot  Study  of  Health  Services  Deployment  Using Communications  Satellite  for  the  Underserved  in  Nigeria".  British  Journal  of  Healthcare  and  Medical Research (BJHMR). DOI:https://doi.org/10.14738/bjhmr.103.2023. Published: 2023-05-09. https://journals.scholarpublishing.org/index.php/JBEMi/article/view/14715  

The Satellite 4 Digital Health (S4DH) Poster Stand with Logos of Collaborating Partners and Institutions across 3 Continents for Display at any Telemedicine Outreach Location

ONGOING RESEARCH STEMMING FROM BARRIERS ENCOUNTERED IN FIELD TRIALS AND PILOTS TO FAST-TRACK TELEMEDICINE DRIVE AND ADOPTION IN RURAL AFRICA SECTIONED INTO 2 BROAD DIMENSIONS:

ADVANCING TELEMEDICINE ADOPTION IN RURAL AFRICA THROUGH DEEP LEARNING-BASED MULTILINGUAL TRANSLATION USING LARGE LANGUAGE MODELS (LLMs). ETHICS, GOVERNANCE, POLICY AND SAFETY CONSIDERATIONS IN THE USE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) FOR DIGITAL HEALTH SYSTEMS, ELECTRICITY TRANSITION AS WELL AS FOCUS ON GEO-REGIONAL INFLUENCE TO ADDRESS GLOBAL INEQUALITY AND AI COLONIALISM . We are specifically integrating deep learning–based multilingual translation using LLMs into our telemedicine platform, achieving ≥90% translation accuracy in Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, and other African languages within 12 months, and piloting the system after beta validation in rural communities and internally displaced persons(IDP) camps within 24 months..

Mobile 1.2m Composite Ku-Band Very Small Aperture Terminal (VSAT)

Mobile 1.2m Composite Ku-Band Reflector with Circular Hand Crank for Emergency/Manual Stow of Azimuth and Elevation Axes integrated with Ku-band 4W BUC and LNB undergoing series of tests before deployment in Internal Displaced Persons (IDP) camps and Akwa-Ibom State

NIGCOMSAT Ltd Vehicle with Kyemeta Flat Panel Antenna utilized for Telemedicine Outreach

Mobile Vehicle with Kyemeta Antenna owned by NIGCOMSAT Ltd used to deliver Telemedicine in remote areas without Electricity.

2023 IET Global Impact-in-Society Award in Healthy Lives-Assisted Living, Robotics Category

The award was in recognition of measurable societal impact and  contributions in Telemedicine via NIGCOMSAT-1R Communications Satellite to fast-track UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3 especially in rural and undeserved communities led by Dr. Lasisi Salami LAWAL as the Principal Investigator (PI) with Collaborating Partners and Co-Investigators which includes NIGCOMSAT Ltd and Futminna (Host University). The Telemedicine research project won the 2023 Institution of Engineering and Technology's Impact-in-Society Award for Healthy lives, assisted living & robotics category on 28th  March 2023. https://www.bawa.tech/blog/iet-impact-in-society-winners.

2023 IET Global Impact-in-Society Award in Healthy Lives-Assisted Living, Robotics Category