Questions 1:

1) Our healthcare app should be able to do:

• Education: Inform the community about healthcare and the
importance of equality in the healthcare system.
• Healthcare Pricing: Provide information on healthcare costs and
available resources in the country.
• Emergency Contact Details: Include clear contact information
for emergencies and emergency vehicle numbers.
• Health Records Access: Secure access to personal health
records (medical history, medications, allergies).
• Appointment Scheduling: Functionality to schedule, reschedule,
and cancel appointments with healthcare providers.
• Medication Management: Reminders for medication adherence,
medication information (dosage, side effects), and tracking
medication use.
• Symptom Checker: General guidance based on symptoms with
disclaimers that it’s not a substitute for professional advice.
• Health Monitoring: Integration with wearable devices or manual
input to monitor vital signs (blood pressure, glucose levels,
heart rate).
• Educational Resources: Access to credible, up-to-date health
information, articles, videos, and wellness tips.
• Emergency Contact Information: Quick access to emergency
contacts, local emergency services, and urgent care
instructions.
• Insurance Information: Details on insurance coverage, benefits,
co-pays, and claims filing.
• Secure Messaging: A secure channel for contacting healthcare
providers with questions or concerns.
• Privacy and Security: Clear information on data protection and
privacy settings management.
Our healthcare app should not be able to do:
• Specific Diagnosis: Avoid providing specific medical diagnoses;
these require detailed assessment by qualified professionals.
• Treatment Plans: Do not provide detailed treatment plans or
personalised medical advice; these should be tailored to
individual cases by healthcare providers in person.
• Prescription Generation: Do not have the capability to prescribe
medication or adjust treatment regimens; prescriptions must
come from licensed medical professionals.
• In-Person Physical Examination: Cannot perform physical
examinations or diagnostic tests that require direct interaction
or specialised equipment.
• Sensitive Personal Data: Avoid collecting or sharing sensitive
personal data without explicit consent, including highly
personal or potentially stigmatising information.
• Inaccurate or Unverified Information: Do not spread unverified,
misleading, or incorrect health information; ensure all content
is evidence-based and reviewed by experts.
• Legal or Insurance Advice: Do not offer legal advice or
insurance counselling; these matters require professional
expertise beyond the app’s scope.
Commitment to inclusivity and equality
At the heart of our mission is a commitment to inclusivity for all
individuals, regardless of their abilities, conditions, or
backgrounds. Our app is designed to embrace and support
every user, reflecting our belief in the fundamental importance
of equality within the healthcare system. It is crucial that
everyone in our country feels welcomed and has equal access
to opportunities.
To address the disparity between public and private healthcare
sectors, we aim to bridge this gap and reduce divisions within
our society. Recognizing the challenges faced by those living in
underserved or economically disadvantaged areas, we are
dedicated to making our app accessible to everyone, no matter
their location or circumstances.
To reach people across various regions, including rural areas,
we will use targeted advertising on billboards and signage.
Additionally, our team of qualified doctors will visit these areas
to provide education and support directly, ensuring that those
in need receive appropriate care.
Our app is designed with several accessibility features to cater
to diverse needs:
• Visual Accessibility: We offer a high-contrast mode for users
with low vision, options to enlarge text size, and text-to-speech
functionality for those who prefer auditory information.
• Hearing Accessibility: Subtitles will be provided for all video and
audio content to assist users with hearing impairments.
• Motor Accessibility: We will ensure that touch targets are large
enough to facilitate navigation for users with motor disabilities.
• Cognitive Accessibility: A detailed, easy-to-follow guide will be
available to help users understand how to use the app. We will
also use plain language to ensure content is accessible to all
users, including younger audiences and those who may
struggle with complex topics.
By implementing these features and strategies, we are dedicated
to
creating an app that is truly inclusive and accessible to everyone,
fostering a more equitable and connected healthcare
experiences.

2) For an app, we need to address how everyone will be able to

access it. Many people in South Africa may not have access or
can’t afford modern cellphones which are particularly important
for apps. Some people in the population may not be able to
even afford any cellphone for that matter. Therefore, making an
app which can be added to a phone of any type is vital. Many
people in Sou Africa do not have proper education p, therefore
making an app that is easy to use to ensure the apps efficacy
and usage.
3) Ensuring privacy on our app is extremely important. On a
medical app where we would contain person information and
confidential information, it is essential we reduce the chance of
hackers and other forms of danger for our app, to ensure the
safety of our app, the information on our app, and all the
citizens who are using our app.
To ensure the privacy of our app and not allow for hackers we
can implement the following procedures:
• We can protect data by using data encryption – By converting
information into a code to prevent unauthorised access, you
can ensure that even if data is intercepted, it remains
unreadable to hackers trying to gain personal information from
the app.
• We can us two-factor authentication - This can ensure that all
those who use our app and sign into out app have to have two
ways of identifying themselves and therefore hackers cant
identify as another person and your privacy remains safe.
• We can ensure people have strong passwords – Passwords
should be strong and unique with a combination of letters,
numbers and symbols when they log in and use our app to
reduce the chance of hackers guessing your password and
hacking your account.
• We can make our website offline – By not needing to use
public WI-FI and being able to access our website without WI-FI
connection, it can ensure that you do not share private
information to the public.
• We can ensure user privacy – We can clearly communicate
our apps privacy policy and outline how data is collected, used,
and protected.
• We can have user consent – We can obtain explicit consent
from users before collecting personal data.
All the data submitted by the citizens using our app will be sent
and kept in the cloud storage and databases of the South
African health care system to ensure easy accessibility and so
that people know where to find all the information they need in
a secure place. We can also keep all physical paper work in
filing storage systems on the premises of the healthcare service
to keep all the documents safe and in alphabetical order to
easily find all records and medical documents for all the heal
are service patients.

4) Should ensure that all the medical records that are present
on the app are secure. And to access those medical records you
have to have to go through an intense recondition process to
ensure that anyone should not be accessing your medics,
records are doing so. Ensure that tte people using the app know
that when giving information about treatment or diagnosis it is
just a guideline and if there are further inquiries a medical
professional need to be seen. This ensures that that the app
doesn’t take any accountability for a diagnosis that is off as it is
just a guideline. The app should ensure ensure to constantly
updating information regarding medical cellphone numbers,
insurance policies and medical records. This ensures that
everything is up to date and the people using the app are not
hindered due to mistakes in the app if a mistake does occur the
team which will be doing the updates will have to take
accountability. This ensures that every team working fir the app
ensures that there are no mistakes.
5) One of the other major aspects to consider in the healthcare
department is the disparities between private and public
healthcare systems. In many public systems, there is a need for
more doctors and nurses. In rural areas, we may not have the
correct resources or access to essential equipment needed for
medical practice. We could try and provide full scholarships to
pupils waiting to study medicine for their time of studying and
in return they have to commit to working in the rural areas of
our country where there is a shortage of doctors. We should
also build more medical school facilities to allow for more
resources to educate more pupils and increase the number of
doctors we have in our country. Doctors and nurses should get
paid more for working in rural areas as an incentive to work
there. We should build bigger facilities and provide more
resources in rural areas to help accommodate for our big
population so that everyone, no matter your income can get
quality healthcare. We can try charge more taxes on the richer
and less on the poor, as in a progressive tax system, to
accommodate for the money needed to provide quality
healthcare to those who cannot afford it. We also need to
minimise corruption and ensure that all the taxes we are
paying to our government are used efficiently and for the right
reasons to increase the quality of public healthcare and ensure
that no matter your facility or what you can afford, both public
and private sectors of healthcare provide high quality
healthcare services.
6)To ensure that our app is used professionally and with
integrity, as well as respecting user’s privacy, we can take
various steps. To start off, we can have the users agree to an
agreement on what is expected of them – Integrity and respect
for other’s privacy. If this agreement is broken, users will be
banned, flagged, and even sued. We will have users set up
password-protected accounts, and ensure a strong password is
set to prevent any hacking into accounts. We can set up a
system, similar to Instagram, where accounts are private and in
order to communicate with each other, both users have to
accept. A report button will be added to give users
opportunities to report dangers or suspicions to us, which we
can handle professionally. Whilst we can’t control what humans
will do on our app, we can control what they are unable to do
and set up safety precautions and expectations for each user.
In doing this we are keeping our app safe and private.

7) Using AI would be a very useful tool to incorporate into our

app. It can assist with speedy, 24/7 answers when a specialised
professional is not available. This can prevent any emergency
cases. AI can also contribute to keeping records of patient
history. This will ensure that patients are equipped with the
right medication and advice by the professionals. To conclude,
AI on its own is not a good idea, however, combined with the
human brain, emotions, and skills, it can contribute greatly to
our Healthcare App.