Sana

Sana's mission is to revolutionize healthcare delivery for rural underserved populations. To this end, Sana provides an open-source Android-based telemedicine platform for clinical research and best-practice health care delivery.

The Sana system, which includes at least one smart phone and a Web-connected server, grew out of an MIT NextLab class and another mobile-technology class taught by Hal Abelson, the Class of 1922 Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, offered in 2008. Several students from both classes developed the software code for Sana and formed a volunteer organization to distribute the code for free and help deploy Sana in developing countries.

Sana (formerly known as Moca) joins a slew of mobile-health solutions that are targeted at the developing world, including ChildCount+, an application aimed at improving child survival and maternal health by using text messages to coordinate community health-care workers who use phones to register patients and report their health status to central web dashboard.

The mission is to revolutionize healthcare delivery in remote areas through innovative mobile information services that improve patient access to medical specialists for faster, high quality, and more cost effective diagnosis and intervention.

Based on the work and contributions of students, volunteers, partner organizations, and sponsors, Sana offers an open source data collection and collaboration platforms for clinical research and best practice health care delivery for underserved rural populations.

One of the largest problems facing the developing world is a lack of trained physicians. While there is not a shortage of untrained or semi-trained workforce, many health workers in many developing nations are not able to dispense adequate care due to a lack of expertise.