FAQs 2.0

FAQs 2.0

About Digital Health Week

What is Digital Health Week?

Digital Health Week is a global week of action to celebrate, promote and advocate for digital health and its critical role in providing health for all by 2030. Digital Health Week is an opportunity for diverse stakeholders within and across sectors to come together at national and regional levels to exchange ideas and experiences, reach consensus on the main challenges and opportunities in their contexts and agree on what needs to happen to ensure digital transformation of health to achieve universal health coverage.

Why is this needed?

Digital health has been with us for nearly two decades. Despite the availability of the technology and proven strategies for their effective scaling, digital health is still being applied in a siloed, fragmented way that has prevented sustainable and scalable models being applied holistically by governments. Further, the lack of digital access and literacy, opaque health data rights, and the lack of engagement of people, particularly marginalised and hard to reach communities, in the planning, development and assessment of digital tools, impede progress to universal health coverage using digital technologies. Digital Health Week is an opportunity to hear the multitudes of stories around digital health, its successes and its challenges. It offers the opportunity for all those involved in digital health to collaborate, to come together as a community, to build up a collective narrative and to reach out to others in government, civil society, the private sector, professional bodies and academia and encourage them to support the digital transformation of health systems to achieve UHC.

Who is organising it?

Transform Health is creating this space and facilitating the launch of the first Digital Health Week across different countries and regions. However, this is not a Transform Health branded event – Digital Health Week is a space for all actors involved in digital health to organise their own events and promote their own work and issues, in collaboration with others, to ensure digital technology and data can help the world achieve its Universal Health Coverage goal.

Who can participate in Digital Health Week?

Anyone working in or interested in digital health can participate in Digital Health Week by making a commitment or hosting an event in their community. It is a moment that everyone can make their own! All vetted events and commitments will be publicly listed on the Digital Health Week website as a part of this global moment, to encourage collaboration, participation and public accountability.

What will happen during Digital Health Week?

Participating organisations from across the world, including Transform Health, will:

  • Host events in their respective countries and regions
  • Make public commitments towards advancing the digital transformation of health
  • Tell the digital health story of their communities by producing multimedia content

What does Digital Health Week aim to achieve?

Digital Health Week aims to bring more people into the conversation on digital transformation of health systems, people who may have an important role to play in ensuring it happens and in a way that is equitable and inclusive. It is also an opportunity to generate greater understanding of and visibility for the digital health and its potential to accelerate UHC.

What is the theme of this year’s Digital Health Week?

Bridging the technical-political divide Developing an enabling environment for the digital transformation of health requires sustained collaboration between technical experts, governments, research institutions, civil society organisations and patients groups and communities in order to build systems that respond to everyone’s needs. To achieve this we need to move out of technical and corporate silos and ensure greater leadership and digital transformation becomes a government priority. The surest way to ensure this is by building up public understanding and support for the vital contribution digital technology can make to all our health, if applied correctly. Transform Health and its partners are working within this theme on the issue of digital and data governance and the need for stronger health data governance. We invite organisations to join the conversation, take action, endorse the Health Data Governance Principles and organise events on this issue.

How can I get involved?

Spotlight your organisation’s efforts, build partnerships and hear from experts around the world by getting involved in this global week of action. Download the participation guide for more information. There are three key modes of engagement in Digital Health Week: 1. Host an event Bring together diverse stakeholders in your region, country or community to discuss the challenges and opportunities of digital health, and how we can work together to bridge the technical-political divide. NOTE: You will be responsible for organising and managing your events. Virtual events will be hosted on the DHW virtual event platform. 2. Submit a commitment Showcase your organisation’s ongoing work and future plans to accelerate the digital transformation of health by making a SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound) commitment. Commitments can be financial, technical, programmatic or advocacy-based, among others! 3. Tell your digital health story Champion the potential of digital health to deliver health for all by writing an op-ed, publishing content on social media, or filming a video. Digital Health Week will feature diverse voices and perspectives on digital health from various regions, contexts and communities.

Who else is participating?

Last year, over 80 organisations participated in the inaugural Digital Health Week, including the WHO, GIZ, PharmAccess Foundation, Living Goods, Terres des Hommes, and IAKMI (Indonesian Public Health Foundation) among others

Do I have to pay to participate?

No, Digital Health Week is a global moment open to all to participate in for free.

About Commitments

What do you mean by making a commitment?

A commitment is a pledge made by organisations, governments or collaboratives towards the digital transformation of health systems and the use of data to advance Universal Health Coverage. Making a public commitment during Digital Health Week allows your work in this area to be spotlighted, facilitates public accountability, and encourages partnership and collaboration between relevant stakeholders

What kind of commitment can I make?

The commitment must promote or advance the role of digital technologies and data in achieving health for all, and can be:

  • A financial or resource commitment
  • A technical commitment
  • A research and knowledge based commitment
  • A regulatory, legislative or normative commitment
  • An outreach and communications commitment
  • An advocacy and accountability commitment
  • A commitment to diversity and inclusion

What criteria should my commitment fall under?

Specific: Commitments must be country specific. In case it is impacting multiple countries, this needs to be set out clearly. Measurable: Commitments need to be outcome driven, targeting a specific change. If the commitment is output driven, it needs to clearly identify the value and the impact of the output on the ecosystem within a given country. Organisations will be asked to set out high level indicators for success. Achievable: Commitments need to be achievable within a given timeline (the next 5 years). Relevant: Commitments need to make a contribution to the digital transformation of health systems and the use of data to achieve UHC in a given country. Organisations will be asked to explain how their commitment will achieve this. Timebound: Organisations will be asked to set out within what time period they hope to achieve the outcomes they seek through their commitment.

What should a commitment look like?

Here are three sample commitments:

  • Our organisation will consult all our partners and do a landscape analysis on the legislative and regulatory barriers to the digital transformation of the health system in Indonesia. We will then work with the government to ensure the development of at least one piece of legislation that enables digital transformation while protecting the rights of citizens within the next parliamentary session in October 2022.
  • We will institutionalise the SafeCare programme across three counties in Ghana as a means of improving quality of primary health care services, using digital technology and data for better informed decision making, by January 2023.
  • We will publish at least one major publication (such as peer-reviewed article, impact studies) annually, sharing research findings on our work and lessons on how mobile and digital innovations drive financial inclusion, increase access, improve quality and reduce costs of care by June 2022.

Does the commitment need to be a new initiative or contribution?

Whilst new and ambitious commitments are encouraged, the commitment can also be part of your existing body of work or set of priorities.

If you are making a commitment based on a donor-funded project, you will need to ensure you can make this commitment as an organisation and that you are not bound by the donor agreement to credit that commitment or contribution to the donor funding the initiative.

How can I make a commitment?

Submit THIS form on the Participate page of the DHW website.

What will happen to this commitment once made?

All commitments will be displayed on the Commitments page, giving everybody an opportunity to know who is working on a particular issue in a given context. We will then invite organisations to report back on their commitment on an annual basis, allowing us to tell the story of progress towards the common goal of digital transformation in a given country. Organisations that have made commitments in previous years are invited to reaffirm their commitment by marking progress made.

About Events

Who can organise an event?

Any organisation working on issues related to digital health can organise an event during Digital Health Week. We would encourage you to register your event on the Digital Health Week website so that we can promote it on your behalf and explore the possibility of linking you up with other partners or event organisers who may be interested in collaborating with you.

What type of events can I organise?

Partners can organise a broad range of events with the central theme of ‘bridging the technical-political divide in digital health’. Below are examples of types of events you may want to consider:

  • Parliamentary meetings and events
  • Multi-stakeholder roundtables with the government, private sector, academia, civil society and professional bodies
  • Meetings with different organisations to share experiences and learning
  • Project visits
  • Youth and student led events
  • Launch of publications, reports, statements, commentaries etc. – e.g., publishing a landscape analysis report.
  • Social media campaigns – videos, infographics, blog posts, newsletters, petitions, podcasts etc.
  • Press conferences, media coverage, op-eds.

Are there any guidelines for hosting an event during Digital Health Week?

While organisations are free to organise their events as they like, it is recommended that DHW events:

  • Have a country-specific or region-specific focus.
  • Include the voices of youth, women and marginalised groups in the local context as speakers and experts.
  • Have a tangible output and outcome arising from the event.

How can I sign up to host an event during Digital Health Week?

Register your event here, with key details about title, date, time and event format. You can modify or update your submission to add agenda or speaker details etc. till September 10th, 2022. 

Where will Digital Health Week events be hosted or streamed?

Digital Health Week events can be virtual, hybrid or in-person events. Organisations are responsible for organising and managing their own events – including deciding the topic, finding speakers, and engaging with the audience. This year, we are simplifying the process of hosting virtual events with a centralised virtual event platform, which will stream all virtual events, register all virtual attendees and display the overall schedule. In-person events will be listed on the agenda, but registration and other logistics will be done by the host organisation. (An external registration link can be added to the DHW platform). However, we encourage you to add a hybrid (live-streaming) element to your in-person event, ensuring that it can be streamed on the events platform and reach a wider audience.

How will Digital Health Week support my event?

  1. The Resources section on the Digital Health Week website contains key messages and fact-sheets that can help you conceptualise and plan your event.
  2. Digital Health Week is taking over the technical setup of virtual events this year with the virtual events platform, leaving you with more time to plan the best event possible!
  3. Once your event is submitted and approved, it will be shared on the Digital Health Week platform, reaching a wider audience and having more people learn about your work. The event will be amplifying across Transform Health’s social media channels and that of its partners’.

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