Winner
MedShr's COVID-19 Education Programme Across Africa and Middle East: Supporting over 360,000 HCPs Respond to the Pandemic
Summary of work
11 March 2020: The WHO declared the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak a global pandemic. Face-face activities became limited before lockdowns came into force. As the leading digital platform for HCPs, it was clear that MedShr needed to support HCPs through the pandemic.
Our initial response was to launch discussion networks that allowed for peer-to-peer learning and knowledge sharing between doctors in China and Italy, and those in the rest of Europe where cases were growing exponentially. Within a week, there were over 12,000 doctors in these groups on the MedShr platform sharing their experiences.
The next step was to review the need for education and knowledge sharing in a global context. With as few as 1-2 doctors per 10,000 in many African and Middle Eastern countries, it became clear that already fragile and under-resourced healthcare systems were at risk of being overwhelmed with potentially catastrophic results.
By 31 March, we had support from the Austrian Development Agency to deliver education digitally to HCPs responding to the pandemic via MedShr’s digital technology.
With a comprehensive digital approach employed, the scale of this programme was overwhelming, reaching over 366,000 HCPs with impactful education as they responded to the pandemic.
Judges’ comments
The MedShr's COVID-19 Education Programme Across Africa and Middle East was the stand out entry in the category. Built on a robust set of objectives and strategies, and implemented with excellence, this HCP-focussed campaign delivered not only strong results, but also improvement in clinical practice, addressing real needs in the community.
