tibanet

BACKGROUND

The Kenya Government’s drive towards the provision of universal health care has met with several challenges such as shortage of government budgetary resources, resource misuse, service delivery infrastructure gaps in public healthcare facilities and labour unrest among health workers. Further, approximately 80% of Kenyans have no health Insurance and rely on out-of-pocket payments to finance their healthcare needs.

These challenges have resulted in an increasing reliance on small private hospitals and clinics for the provision of care to the majority of the Kenyan population.

However, the cost of medication in these facilities are high in comparison to costs in the larger private hospitals because large hospitals procure in bulk (and receive large discounts), whilst small hospitals do not. Studies have shown that in the private sector, the retail cost of healthcare products is over 30 times more expensive when compared to regional and international indices.

TIBANET GROUP PROCUREMENT SCHEME

CDMS has developed tibanet, an online Group Purchasing e-commerce platform that aggregates hospitals’ purchasing volumes with prequalified manufacturers and distributors, enabling them to realize savings and efficiencies. The tibanet platform links hospitals with prequalified suppliers thus enabling them to easily find and buy any supplies at prices that have been pre -negotiated. It therefore empowers hospitals to maximize their success.

It is against this backdrop that the Chronic Drugs Medical Scheme has joined hands with hospitals to establish a partnership that will provide free and easy access for to the tibanet platform to enable them benefit from lower procurement costs which would in turn result in lowering the cost of medication for millions of low-income Kenyans across the country.

tibanet PORTAL

TIBANET VIRTUAL TRAINING FOR HEALTH WORKERS

Kenya’s health system relies heavily on services provided by mid-level health workers (MLWs). Investment in their training is therefore of utmost importance as many of them work in rural underserved areas. They require training programs that can ensure that their skills are regularly updated, remain relevant to their practice and reflect contemporary advances in health professional education.

The tibanet training model uses a hub and-spoke knowledge-sharing approach where local and international trainers lead virtual sessions to educate health workers. In so doing we tackle the challenges of enforced social distancing and are able to transfer high quality skills that increase the capacity of health workers to deliver best-in-practice care and also earn Continuous Professional Development (CPD) points.