The workshop is open to all Duke students.  Continental breakfast, sandwich lunch, and refreshments provided.  Space is limited to 50 participants so be sure to sign up soon!

"Mounting interest in the field of mHealth-- the provision of health-related services via mobile communications-- can be traced to the evolution of several interrelated trends. In many parts of the world, epidemics and a shortage of healthcare workers continue to present grave challenges for governments and health providers. Yet in these same places, the explosive growth of mobile comunications over the past decade offers a new hope for the promotion of quality healthcare" (UN Foundation).

The Global Digital Health Science Center invites you to join in on a panel discussion featuring on mHealth apps featuring:

• Gary Bennet, Professor, Psychology and Neuroscience and Global Health
• Krishna Udayakumar, Associate Professor of the Practice, Global Health and Medicine
• Ricky Bloomfield, Assistant Professor, Medicine and Global Health

A film for those who believe that anyone can change the world.  #WhoCaresDuke

18 Social Entrepreneurs. 10 Countries. 1 Film.

Please join for a screening of WHO CARES?, an award-winning film that shares the spirit of social entrepreneurship through individuals who are driven to dedicate their life to changing the world for good! By telling the stories of 18 social entrepreneurs across 10 countries, this film captures the energy and drive of changemakers who will not rest until their vision for a better world is achieved.

FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
SNACKS & REFRESHMENTS SERVED

Presented by the Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative, Duke Center for Documentary Studies, and the Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship

I cannot believe that two-month internship at the World Health Organization (WHO) is going to end soon. This is truly a wonderful and unforgettable experience for me as a future global health researcher. I met a group of talented interns who have the same passion for global health and are willing to dedicate their entire lives to bridging the gaps between developing and developed world in public health. I was also lucky to work with my amazing supervisor Islene Araujo de Carvalho, who leads me to the evidence-based policy-making world by showing me how it works in the field.

The department I was interning in is Age and Life Course and our focus is to create an ageing-friendly world where every elder can enjoy a healthy ageing life. I primarily worked on the Knowledge Translation on Ageing and Health (KT) project, of which the aim is to facilitate the development of evidence-based policy responses to ageing globally. China is one of the two piloted countries of KT project given its rapid ageing situation and the availability of data from the WHO Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (a nationally representative sample comprised of eight provinces on older people’s health).

Initiated in November, 2013, the KT China project aims to facilitate evidence-informed policies and priorities for elderly health and establish a multi-sector collaboration mechanism for elderly health efforts to improve health status of the elderly in China. Led by China National Health and Family Planning Commission (NHFPC) and WHO Country Office in China, the project consists of four major steps to close the gap between research and policy-making on ageing: 1) identify priority problems on ageing in China; 2) synthesize and package evidence on interventions; 3) engage local policy-makers and experts for a national policy dialogue and policy briefs and 4) implement policy-directed interventions. The China project was on the second stage and most of my work was to help coordinate the project partners and prepare for the policy briefs.

Evidence-based policy-making is definitely a new idea in China and the traditional way of policy-making depends on experts’ opinions instead of research evidence. As a loyal supporter of the evidence-based policy-making, I am excited to witness the change and be given the opportunity to foster its happening. While I was working on synthesizing the evidence, however, I did have a few concerns towards the evidence: 1) Most of the high-quality evidence, typically randomized control trails, are from high income countries rather than developing countries where the interventions are going to be implemented in; 2) Some systematic reviews find that the evidences available, for example in long-term care, are pretty weak and limited. Bad-quality evidences will surely mislead policy-makers and result in unimaginable consequences to the society. There is a need for well-designed high-quality researches whose results can boost the policy development, especially in developing countries where the research capacity is a huge issue. How to help build the research capacity should be another import area to work on. Further, personally I think as a policy-maker he or she should be able to distinguish good evidences from under-qualified ones. Having a research background is more than necessary for policy-makers, which, however, is often not the case in countries where evidence-based policy-making is novel. 

It involves system thinking in fostering evidence-based policy-making in developing countries. Neither building evidence pool nor research capacity alone can create an enabling environment for its development. Seven elements, as the WHO framework has highlighted, are essential to formulate and influence evidence-based policy-making. These elements include: “1) Context looks at whether ageing is included in current policy agendas and if the health system values the use of research to inform policy-making; 2) Linkage and Exchange Efforts examine the relationships needed to enable the use of evidence; 3) Knowledge Creation looks at the opportunities and existing capacity to conduct relevant research in the local context; 4) Push Efforts assesses whether the information is pushed to different user groups in appropriate formats; 5) Pull Efforts are the efforts of policy-makers to seek and use research on ageing and health; 6) Facilitating Pull Efforts relates to systems that enable access to relevant research in ageing and health: for example, technical infrastructure, ‘one-stop websites’ and unrestricted access to online resources and journals providing research evidence on ageing and health; 7) Evaluation Efforts assess whether health systems allocate resources and funding to monitor implementation and evaluate the impact of evidence informed decision making in ageing and health.” (Cited from the WHO Ageing and Life Course internal working paper)

It does take time and efforts to achieve such an enabling environment for evidence-based policy making and hopefully I can be part of it to make it happen in China. 

Looking for ways to get involved in SEAD, social entrepreneurship, and global health at Duke?  Don't miss these upcoming opportunities!

When: Thursday, September 18th 12:00pm
Where: Trent Hall Room 040, Duke West Campus
Website: http://globalhealth.duke.edu/calendar#event-33123

Currently, David Epstein is the Director of Duke-NUS's Centre for Technology & Development (CTeD), the aim of which is to advance healthcare innovations derived through Duke-NUS' partnerships with SingHealth and the Singapore healthcare cluster.  Epstein's work within CTeD focuses on entrepreneurship and developing novel models of value creation and value capture. He is particularly interested in understanding how "closed ecosystems" such as that in Singapore, impact innovation & improvements in healthcare delivery. In 2014, he was named the founding Director of Singapore's National Health Innovation Centre (NHIC) which is funded and overseen by the National Medical Research Council (NMRC) with the aim of providing the clinical research sector long-term financial support and strategic guidance related to innovation and commercialization. 

When: Thursday, September 18th 4:30pm
Where: Gross Hall, Duke West Campus
Website: http://entrepreneurship.duke.edu 

Join us to learn more about our programs and activities for students, including entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship clubs, TheCube selective living center, DUHatch, Innovation Co-Lab, Melissa & Doug Entrepreneurs, Duke in Silicon Valley, Duke in Chicago, DukeEngage in Detroit, Summer Innovation Program, Bass Connections, American Underground, HQ Raleigh, and more…

SEAD is currently hiring two Research Assistants for the 2014-2015 academic year to work between 8
and 10 hours a week at Fuqua’s standard rate ($11.50 to $12/hour) This is a great opportunity for MBA
students to work on mini-consulting projects and gain a breadth of exposure to the healthcare
innovation space.

These positions will be managed by IPIHD and the RAs will primarily work from IPIHD’s offices located in
the American Tobacco Campus, downtown Durham. Some hours can also be worked in the SEAD/CASE
suite in Fuqua.  

Read the full description here.  Applications are due Friday, September 19th.

When: Friday, September 19th 2:00pm
Where: Teer Hall 115
Website: http://gwht.pratt.duke.edu/gwht-informational-session


All freshmen, sophomores and juniors from the Trinity School and the Pratt School are invited to attend the first GWHT Center Info Session on Friday, September 19th at 2pm in Teer Building, room 115. 

If you want to know more about the center or if you have some questions that need to be answered, this is the event come to. We will be discussing the GWHT fellowship, the GWHT program, and how to get involved at any undergraduate level.

On Tuesday, September 16th at 5:45pm (Fuqua School of Business, Lilly Classroom), Alden Zecha, CFO and Strategist of SEAD Innovator Sproxil will discuss the challenges in scaling their pharmaceutical anti-counterfeiting technology globally.

Responsible for the company's overall business strategy, Alden also leads the finance and administration departments for Sproxil globally. He brings more than 20 years of broad-range executive expertise in operations, business planning and finance to the role. His vast experience includes working with companies in more than 20 countries. 

Sproxil uses mobile technology to combat counterfeiting and increase brand equity with innovative, consumer-focused product protection and targeted marketing solutions. Its award-winning Mobile Product Authentication™ (MPA™) technology drives revenue and engages consumers at point of sale through brand assurance, fraud protection, and loyalty rewards. MPA is touted as the most-widely used solution of its kind, deployed by several large companies across ten industries and protecting millions of consumers around the world. 


A light reception will follow.

Do you have an idea that you think could change the world?  Are you looking for mentorship and cash to help you bring your innovation to developing countries?  Do you want to meet with other student social entrepreneurs and innovators from across the globe?

The TechCon 2014 Innovation Marketplace showcases the concepts, innovations, and research of young innovators focused on international development. The Innovation Marketplace will take place on Monday, November 10th on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, as an integral part of USAID's Higher Education Solutions Network (HESN) TechCon 2014 agenda.

Cash  and in-kind awards will be made to the top innovators and researchers. This is an excellent opportunity to get exposure for you and your idea, build support for your project, receive technical feedback, and to practice your pitching skills.
Projects can be submitted to one of three categories:

• Innovation- your device, approach, or system is ready to go in the field!
• Research- wow, what you have just figured out is incredibly interesting, important, and changes everything!
• Concept- you have the next great idea and have begun working on it!

All applications, including all supporting documents and links to required multimedia files, must be submitted to SEAD by 
Monday, September 22nd. The SEAD team will evaluate all applications for completion and merit. The top ranked applications will then be submitted to USAID for final review and selection of Innovation Marketplace participants. SEAD will have a limited number of travel grants available to participants. 

View the documents below for submission requirements and how sell your idea through multimedia:

Throughout the summer, SEAD interns have been sharing with us stories and experiences from their summer internships.  Today's post comes to us from Divya Giyanani, who interned with USAID in the Global Development Lab.  The Global Development Lab "brings together a diverse set of partners to discover, test, and scale breakthrough solutions to achieve... the end of extreme poverty by 2030."

A wicked problem is like a tangled ball of yarn.  Each piece of the yarn that you pull can have positive and/or negative effects on the rest of this tangled ball; while some implications are expected and accounted for, others are unexpected and sometimes even unknown until much too late.  Thus, it is important to exercise immense amounts of caution when dealing with a tangled ball of yarn…or a wicked problem, if I might end my analogy here.

International development is one such wicked problem, and I would argue that it is likely one of the most significant. Between malnutrition and abject poverty, low literacy and inadequate access to basic healthcare, the challenges facing developing areas of the world (not excluding those in our own backyard) are vast, urgent, and complex. And with increasing globalization, the landscape of international development is shifting dramatically; public and private organizations as well as individual philanthropists are entering the field in droves to address these challenges.  As such, the methods and strategies once used are becoming increasingly obsolete. 

In an effort to address these challenges, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) recently launched the Global Development Lab with a role of discovering, testing, and scaling breakthrough development innovations to find solutions to some of the most critical global issues.

As a summer intern with the Lab, I work in the Center for Global Solutions to build platforms and tools around adoption at scale, focusing specifically on scaling adoption of drought-tolerant maize in sub-Saharan Africa.  And if I could describe my experiences thus far, I could, at best, sum it up to be a whirlwind of intense challenge and thrilling opportunity.

During my past month here at USAID, I have had the opportunity to collaborate with various teams across the Lab to conduct value chain analyses and market studies, in order to under the industry as a whole. I have had the opportunity (and the challenge) to think widely, critically, and extensively, and I have been asked to consider the unconventional…then to take it a step further.  I have had the opportunity to work with some of the greatest minds in development, and the opportunity (along with the encouragement) to try, fail, and then try again.

My past month here at USAID has taught me much more than I could ever hope to learn in a classroom.  It has reinforced the idea that development work is hard, that development work is complicated, frustrating, and messy.  But if development work were not difficult, would it even exist?  This work is complicated, frustrating, and messy, but it is also fascinating, enriching, and ever so important. 

As old methods and strategies of development work become obsolete, the Lab seeks to find new ideas, new innovations, and new strategies.  In essence, it’s trying to change the way we do development. And I am grateful for the opportunity to be a part of it.

We think YOU could uncover a Blind Spot!

Blind Spot: an overlooked challenge in international development that can be solved using science, technology, innovation, and strategic partnerships.

The Social Entrepreneurship Accelerator at Duke (SEAD) invites you to enter the Blind Spots Essay Contest today for a chance to win recognition and a cash prize.  Deadline October 1.  Sponsored by USAID’s Global Development Lab, of which Duke University is a part, and Big Ideas @ Berkeley.  This contest is open to all Duke-affiliated students and researchers.

Details:
USAID and Big Ideas@Berkeley want the help of students and researchers to uncover and analyze the “blind spots” in international development. Through your development and field experience, you can help USAID identify development challenges that are currently overlooked, yet are in need of immediate attention. In particular, we want to hear about those unrecognized challenges that would benefit from the power of science, technology, innovation, or strategic partnership (STIP) and potentially improve the lives of millions.

This contest seeks essays, 1750-2000 words in length, which address the following questions:

• What and where is the unrecognized development challenge that you have observed?
• What social, economic, political, and/or environmental barriers exist that are related to this development blind spot? (Please cite studies, reports, and/or data to provide proof/background.)
• Is there a population subset—children, youth, women, minorities, LGBT, etc.—whose lives could be improved as a result?
• If the development blind spot were overcome using STIP, what might the impact be locally, regionally, nationally, or globally (qualitatively and quantitatively)?

The winners of the contest will receive the following cash prizes, as well as a variety of recognition prizes. 
                First place: $3,000
                Second Place: $2,000
                Third Place: $1,000

Deadline: October 1, 2014 
Full details here: http://bigideas.berkeley.edu/compete/blind-spots/ 

If you have any questions, please contact Kim Langsam.  Good luck!

As part of SEAD and USAID's objective to contribute to a broadened and enhanced understanding of the conditions that foster or inhibit effective, sustainable, and scalable innovations in health and healthcare, this summer we put forth an RFP to Duke researchers for projects exploring scaling the impact of global health innovation.  The response we received was exciting and our team had a wealth of research projects to consider as a result!  

While it was a difficult decision, we narrowed down the field to these four projects for this year.  Researchers will be tackling a range of issues from postpartum hemorrhage treatment training in East Africa to social media impact evaluation in Latin America.  We look forward to seeing what insights they obtain through their research!  Below you can read more about each project and the work that they will be doing.  If you would like to find out about future SEAD RFPs, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter.

Allan Shang/Praekelt Foundation: “A Database of Mobile Technology and Cellphone Distribution in South Africa”
Despite being the world's poorest continent, cellphone ownership in Africa approaches almost 80%. We propose to investigate the unprecedented spread of these devices, especially into the poorest, most remote rural areas and develop a model of the distribution pattern. This model would not only attempt to characterize this pattern but also determine the level of technology in use and, if possible, the capabilities of the data network in these rural areas. Using this information, appropriately designed, cellphone-driven medical devices could be disseminated along these targeted distribution routes to the population with the fewest resources and the greatest need.

Gary Bennet, Erica Levine: “A Process & Impact Evaluation of Pro Mujer’s Facebook Intervention: Pro Mujer Salud”
Little is known about how workplaces can leverage social media sites like Facebook to encourage adoption of healthy behaviors and change social norms regarding physical activity and better nutrition. This is especially true in the developing world where chronic disease is becoming increasingly prevalent. Pro Mujer is a social entrepreneurship organization that provides poor women in Latin America with the means to build livelihoods for themselves and their families through financial services, business training, and health care support. The Global Digital Health Science Center at Duke, in partnership with Pro Mujer, is conducting an evaluation of Pro Mujer’s Facebook platform to determine the reach, participation patterns, and engagement levels of the page among staff members. Additionally, we will evaluate the Facebook page’s effect on beliefs about the ease and effectiveness of chronic disease prevention habits such as: eating more fruits and vegetables, avoiding sugary drinks, good oral hygiene, and increasing physical activity. 

Jeff Taekman: “Postpartum Hemorrhage Education Via Simulation”
An inter-professional team in the Human Simulation and Patient Safety Center (HSPSC) is pioneering the use of scalable and distributable healthcare simulation using commercial game technology with a multi-player module that specifically addresses postpartum hemorrhage (PPH).  As a proof-of-concept for global health, the PPH simulation software will be used to address gaps in care at Mulago International Referral Hospital in Kampala, Uganda, and to decrease disparities in healthcare education. We will host inter-professional, interactive, games-based simulation training sessions from Durham to Mulago using the Internet. This pilot program aims to reduce the incidence of postpartum hemorrhage, to serve as a broader model for using simulation to scale education and spread virtual learning through the developing world, and to collect preliminary data to support a future proposal to study the efficacy of screen-based/games-based learning in global health.  

Key personnel include: Jeff Taekman (MD) who is the Principal Investigator, Megan Foureman (CRNA, MSN), Amy Mauritz (MD), Adeyemi Olufolabi (MB.BS; DCH; FRCA), Michael Steele (BS) and Genevieve DeMaria (BS).

Janet Schwartz, Dan Ariely: “Using Behavioral Science to Improve Linda Jamii Registration and Enrollment in Kenya”
Linda Jamii  is a non-profit micro-insurance scheme that provides low and middle-income Kenyans with a financial savings mechanism for health insurance. As is the case in many emerging economies, formal insurance products can be slow to catch on because strong cultural norms guide people to rely more on communal support than formal insurance. Unfortunately, these communal mechanisms are not always enough to cover expenses and people must resort to selling property to finance healthcare. This makes emerging from poverty that much more difficult. This project’s goal is to leverage insights from the behavioral sciences to boost registration and continued enrollment in Linda Jamii health insurance.