UWC Telehealth:Project Progress

Recent visit

In June 2007, we returned to the MUTI site for the thirteenth visit with our Dutch collaborator, Rudi Westerveld. We connected the rural network to a VSAT WiFi network that was built by some of the hospital residents themselves. This shows that despite the lack of use by the nurses, our project demonstrated to the hospital residents the possibilities of rural WiFi. We now have broadband hotspots at Canzibe hospital, Lwandile clinic and Lwandile village headman's house. Our rural WiFi network showed an uptime of 412 days.

As there was a nationwide strike underway, we were only able to conduct interviews with some of the doctors. The doctors believe that the teleconsultation will remain a minor use of the rural network, and that other uses need to be explored. We expect demand and ideas to emerge from the locals. We met several new key players that we hope will become local champions for the use of the broadband Internet access.