DCCC and VODAN Present Public-Private Partnerships for Digital Health: an operational health data infrastructure across nine African countries

Time 

Programme 

Panellist/Presenter 

1 minute 

Welcome and opening remarks 

HDC Secretariat 

5 minutes 

The burning platform: siloes & disconnectedness 

Dr. Jeroen Maas 

Director Access to Care Technology and Partnerships at Philips 

Samson Yohannes Amare 

Lecturer in the department of Software Engineering and Senior Data Scientist under Digital Health Research and Development Center at Mekelle University (MU) 

10 minutes 

On public-private partnerships: we pursue the same goals – why are we so different? 

10 minutes 

DCCC explained 

15 minutes 

VODAN explained 

2 minutes 

Invitation to join VODAN and other DCCC projects 

20 minutes 

Discussion 

1 minute 

Closing remarks 

HDC Secretariat 

Dr. Jeroen Maas works as Director Access to Care Technology and Partnerships at Philips. In that role, he focuses on implementing equitable, economically viable and environmentally sustainable digital health initiatives, and on building the partnerships needed for that. He is director of the transformative platform “Digital Connected Care Coalition” that drives the digital transformation of healthcare in LMIC’s through active project implementation, as a tool towards universal health coverage. 

Before joining Philips, Jeroen worked for 12 years on innovation in healthcare delivery in different roles. The last 7 were focused on getting health data and AI solutions implemented at the patient bedside. He worked -and still works- with governments, academia, SME and multinationals – among others on implementing a regional health data infrastructure in the Amsterdam area to deliver on the mission of two healthy life years extra by 2030. 

Prior to that, Jeroen had diverse innovative roles in industry, consulting, and government in Europe and Africa. He holds a PhD with the topic ‘Stimulating social entrepreneurial behavior’, as well as an MSc in Biology and an MA in Organizational Sciences. 

Jeroen Maas | LinkedIn 

Samson Yohannes Amare is a lecturer in the department of Software Engineering and a senior data scientist under Digital Health Research and Development Center at Mekelle University (MU). He is currently PhD fellow in Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), Netherlands.  Samson has been involved in most of the digital health activities done in MU engaged in software development projects and implementation research. He is actively working on the project Virus Outbreak Data Network Africa and Asia (VODANA), which is a Global Open Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (GO FAIR) Implementation Network that was set up to help fight COVID-19 and beyond such as point of care medical data management. Currently works as a co-lead country lead in VODAN Africa and works in the Digital Innovation Skill Hub (DISH) project. He has also experience on software architecture and enterprise architecture development working closely with OpenHIE and the ministry of health. He was a member of the team that developed the national digital health blueprint that serves as a policy organized by the ministry of health of Ethiopia. His research interests include digital health and data science. He holds a master’s degree in informatics engineering from University of Algarve, Portugal. 

Samson Yohannes Amare | LinkedIn