Kupenda’s New Mobile App Supports COVID-19 Screening and Home-Based Care

by Kupenda

In partnership with our Kenya-based field team (Kuhenza for the Children), Boston University School of Public Health, Dimagi and Sabrams Consulting LLC Kupenda is developing a mobile application to support community-based care and Covid-19 screening, care referrals, and prevention for children with disabilities and their families. This app contains the following features:

  • Child Progress Tracking: The app features enable Kupenda to tracks the physical, social, academic and emotional progress of vulnerable children in our programs, based on the Measure Evaluation project’s Child Status Index, which we have tailored for children with disabilities. Kuhenza and our community leader child advocates have used this tool and our Kilifi County Service Referral Guide to successfully support children with disabilities in Kilifi, Kenya for several years. We are now refining the tool by infusing it with elements of the Washington Group measurements and adapting it for a mobile platform. Pilot testing of the application began with Kuhenza’s staff in early 2020 and will expand for use by our community leader child advocates. The tool will be available for wider use by Kupenda and Kuhenza’s partners in the future.

 

  • Community Leader Child Case Management: 
    The second app includes a weekly reporting form that our community leader child advocates can use to document their disability outreach effortsafter completing our training program. The app also includes a series of informational resources, including our Service Referral Guide, Home Visit Guide, Disability Guidebook, Disability Law Guides and Covid-19 Screening and Prevention best practices guidelines. Community leaders refer to these resources during family counseling sessions and use the reporting form to communicate questions and needs to Kupenda and Kuhenza in a timely manner. Using the app’s prioritization and emergency care features, our staff is then able to provide immediate support to children who showing signs of medical noncompliance, ma
    lnutrition, illness, Covid-19 infection, or abuse.

 

  • GIS Mapping for Community Care Coordination: We are now integrating the existing app content with a GIS map of our innovation center (Kilifi County, Kenya) that shows where the children live, what their needs are, and what services have or have not been provided to them. This map will allow us to prioritize and coordinate our community outreach efforts so more children are served each time we conduct food delivery, home visits, mobile clinics or trainings. The map also allows us to gather and share data that inspires ministries, organizations and agencies to distribute more support and resources to these children.

 

Despite COVID-19 challenges, this mobile application has increased our staff and leaders’ outreach capacity and has enabled them to provide counseling and care for more than 420 children since March.

To learn more about this project, check out the short video created by our Boston University app development team.


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2 thoughts on “Kupenda’s New Mobile App Supports COVID-19 Screening and Home-Based Care

Jake Clarke

Mobile app development is drastically changing and Covid has given it further push.

Reply

    Kupenda

    Indeed! It’s great to see how these technologies are helping Kupenda and other NGOs serve remote communities and collect data more consistently. Thanks for your comment!

    Reply

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