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Assistive technology enhancing lives

Assistive technology enhancing lives

Status: Ongoing

Morogoro United Republic of Tanzania
Print this page City population: 893150Practice started in 2022

Summary

Assistive technology is essential for inclusion and participation, especially among people with disabilities and older persons. The Global report on assistive technology reveals that 2 in 3 people over the age of 60 need assistive technology.

Tanzania’s Ministry of Health, the World Health Organization, and HelpAge International are working together to improve health care for older persons, including access to assistive technology. From 2020, the Ministry of Health collaborated with WHO to ensure access to assistive products through primary health care. A key tool in building the competencies of primary health care personnel to play a role in assistive technology provision is through the WHO online Training in Assistive Products (TAP). TAP prepares health personnel to identify those who may need assistive technology, provide simple assistive products, and/or refer people for more complex products and services. HelpAge Tanzania, known for training healthcare workers in age-friendly practices, supported the implementation of TAP training in the Morogoro Region, working with the local association for older persons to ensure community engagement, advocacy and mobilization at local level.

This project created a referral pathway, linking communities, primary healthcare centers, and district hospitals to enhanced access to assistive products. It supported the provision of assistive products that contribute to maintaining functional abilities for mobility (walking sticks, rollators, therapeutic shoes), self care (toilet and shower chairs), vision (reading glasses), and cognition (pill organizers).

Beneficiaries from rural and urban areas in the Morogoro Region, previously marginalized due to economic limitations, lack of products, low awareness, and disability misconceptions, have benefited from this initiative.

Website: https://www.who.int/teams/health-product-policy-and-standards/assistive-and-medical-technology/assistive-technology/training-in-products.

Key facts

Main target group: Older people with chronic health conditions or disability

Sector(s): Health

Desired outcome for older people:
Meet their basic needs

Other issues the Age-friendly practice aims to address:
  • Ageing in place
  • Inequities
  • Inclusion
  • Participation
  • Technologies

Contact details

Name: Shae, Kylie

Email address: shaek@who.int

Preferred language(s): English

Age-friendly practice in detail (click to expand):

Engaging the wider community

Project lead: Local authorities

Others involved in the project:
  • Older People’s Association
  • Social or health care provider

Older people’s involvement: Older people were involved in the age-friendly practice at multiple or all stages

Moving forward

Has the impact of this age-friendly practice been analysed: No

Do you plan to evaluate your age-friendly practice? Yes

Expansion plans:
The Ministry of Health and their implementing partner Help Age International are now planning expansion of the programme to other regions.

Looking back

Challenges:
At the initial stage of the project, low awareness among community members and low demand for assistive products because of inadequate community mobilization on the availability of assistive products and a lack of understanding of assistive technology. Responding to this challenge, additional religious and community leaders were involved in facilitating awareness-raising among communities in project areas. The leaders were visited by the local association for older persons advocating for the availability of assistive products and information communication materials in the form of posters were shared with the leaders and posted in popular places like the marketplace, and village/ward offices so that they could be accessed by most community members.