Background Reading

Executive Summary (12/1/01)

Our Project Proposal (as of 10/17/01)

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CMC's Project

- First Quarter 2001 Project Report

- PowerPoint Presentation

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Misc. Research

Background on PHCs and ANMs in India

Diagnosing anemia in pregnancy in rural clinics: assessing the potential of the Hemoglobin Color Scale

"Unfamiliar Ground: Designing Technology to Support Rural Healthcare Workers in India." In SIGCHI Bulletin, Volume 30, Number 2, April, 1998.

"Designing a Graphical User Interface for Healthcare Workers in Rural India." In CHI 97 Conference Proceedings.

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Publications from thinkcycle.org

Healthcare Web Services for Handheld Devices in Developing Countries

Lik Mui, Peter Szolovits, Holly Ladd, Rebecca Riccio : MIT Laboratory for Computer Science, SATELLIFE

Topic: Healthcare Web Services

Abstract: This paper discusses the design rationales for a PDA-based data collection and retrieval application for an NGO with healthcare operations in Africa. The application is for collecting and delivering critical information among health professionals working in “unwired” environments in Africa. The general “unwired” approach based on web services can be applied to most developing countries settings.

The Simputer: Radical Simplicity for Universal Access

V. Chandru, V.L. Deshpande, S. Garg, R. Hariharan, S. Manohar, M. Mathias, V. Vinay : The Simputer Trust, Bangalore, India, Email: simputer@csa.iisc.ernet.in

Topic: Collaborative Open-Source Design Platforms

Abstract: The Simputer is a low cost portable alternative to PCs, by which the benefits of information technologies can possibly reach across the digital divide. It has a special role in developing economies because it offers the possibility that illiteracy is no longer a barrier to handling a computer. A key to bridging the digital divide is to have shared devices that permit truly simple and natural user interfaces based on sight, touch and audio.

The Simputer prototypes were launched on April 25th, 2001 and the complete design details of the Simputer have been made available on the web site (www.simputer.org).

In this short note, we discuss our experience in evolving SGPL, the open source design licensing structure for both software and open source hardware and raise the issue of how such new licensing mechanisms can be evolved for products and innovations in fields other than IT.

**SIMPUTER SPECS

Unfamiliar Ground: Designing Technology to Support Rural Healthcare Workers in India

Mike Graves*, Sally Grisedale^, and Alexander Grünsteidl : ConceptLabs* (USA), Excite@Home^ (USA), IDEO (UK)

Topic: Infotech for rural development

Abstract: To broaden the reach of effective computing support into new environments requires different technologies from those we are accustomed to designing and using. One of the key aspects of the India Healthcare Project is to confront unfamiliar conditions and contexts in order to prototype effective handheld computing support for rural Indian healthcare workers. The project involves introducing a technology relatively new to us (Newton), with unfamiliar characteristics (size, display, pen-input), to a community of users with which we were initially totally unfamiliar, doing a job about which we knew virtually nothing. Additionally, we needed to localize Newton software and the MessagePad hardware for Indian languages and physical conditions. In this paper, we lay out the challenges associated with such an undertaking, the strategies we have adopted, the current chronology of the project, some aspects of our current design, and our preliminary findings from field testing.