Zimbabwe's Medical Opportunities

Blog 26 - 27 jan

Today was another hectic day, driving up and down, arranging and paying for various test for mum. Yes it's true one actually has to go out of the hospital and go to the scan center, visit the blood labs, go to mars to book your own ambulance to take the patient to all the tests at various locations across the city. 

What keeps me motivated and positive is as I go through the process I am seeing so many opportunities I am very glad to share with you.

Opportunities I have seen centered around medical care and health provision.

Starting from the top.

Medical Aid
All the current players in the medical aid sector have a policy centered around A minimum of  6 months payments before one can even start to benefit from medical aid. So basically you need to have been paying with no interruption for 6 months before you can make any type of claim for medical aid. When zim moved to usd a lot of people simply stopped paying for medical aid due to lack of funds. So I would say at least half of the population don’t have medical aid.

Opportunity - to offer a package where people who need urgent medical care can offer some sort of equity in return for immediate funds. Say cows, a car, land, a generator basically anything tangible that has value of course. The amounts offered will be in relation to the products offered.

Sounds crazy ha? I guess the reality of the situation is that people are dying over minor diseases due to lack of something like 500 usd. Like seriously, you could walk in with your four severed fingers in your hand, bleeding to death and the emergency unit will simply refuse you entry with out cash or medical aid ipapo.( right there )

Private Ambulance Service
I don't know If you will believe this but according to the nurse who called mars on my behalf to book an ambulance mars charge approx. 250usd for  a 1 km journey return. Isn’t that just ridiculous?

Simple opportunity.
So you've completed nursing and have the qualification and are thinking damn  going back home is a no no cause nursing don't pay in zim. Go and get yourself a st  johns ambulance/paramedics qualification via short course or something, buy  yourself an ambulance, import it to zim and start operating a shuttle ambulance  service between hospitals, check up rooms and specialists. You could easily Charge say 75usd and get Away with it. As compared to 250

Setup your own damn private clinic!
As entry levels into almost all industries are virtually picket fence high clever entrepreneurs are  setting up their own emergency clinics and walk in centers. Take for example the brand new St Micheals 24 hour walk-in clinic just opened in Chitungwiza( a satellite city to Harare). With a  doctor onsite 24 hours a day in a highly dense area like Chitungwiza you can only start to  imagine how much money the location generates charging say 10usd per consultation to almost 100 patient every 24 hours. The center trumps it by also running a pharmacy onsite stocking all  the medicines one would need. 

Let your mind be inspired, your many years trainig as a nurse in the Diaspora were not in vain. Yes working as a nurse in Harare pays very little, but working as a nurse who owns and runs her  walking center really does pay the bills. Just by teaming up with. Doctor and maybe a few other  nurses you can be business owners in one if the most lucrative industries in Zimbabwe.

Hospital software, Zimbabwe
Once at the hospital we were confronted with at least 5 different forms all for different  departments, and all wanting the same information. They could have at least used carbon paper or something to duplicate the data. But heck no we had to complete each form one by one. It  took a whole 20 Mins. The only thing I gained from the experience was the fact that I now know  what my mothers birthday is. Lol.

Opportunity
Develop a easy to customise software solution fit to run a  small 40 - 100 patient
hospital and clinics. Amm currently working one one myself

Other observations were

• Blood and specimen testing times. Just taking too long
• Operating an external specialist medical service. Eg. Become a specialist therapist, surgeon, anastathist, dietitian and all the other sectors within the medical fraternity.The handful of doctors here are absolutely milking it. Charging close to 100 usd per 30 - 45 min visit. Crazy!!!!!

I have loads more observations and could go on and on so will stop here!

If you re keen to move back to Zim and enter the health sector I would be more than happy to share some of the many other observations I made. You can simply comment below and or send me an email.