Serving the Global Community Through eHealth: The Role of Academia

Despite global advances in medical research and sophistication and efficacy in health care management, paradoxically global inequity in health care access continues to persist (WHO, 2006). Underserved populations around the world, in particular, face common challenges in health care access problems including: unclean water and poor sanitation, poverty, geographic isolation, shortage of health professionals and medical supplies, training and supervision of health care workers, and referral systems (Wooton, 2001). These problems reveal that the health of a population or a nation is not only dependent on access to health professionals or treatments, but also governed by societal factors at play in their communities—commonly referred to as social determinants of health (Marmot, 2000). Recognizing the intricate and undeniable geopolitical and socioeconomic relationships to health statuses of nations, as improving one will certainly influence another, the United Nations Millennium declaration in September 2000 embarked upon “. . . (setting) time-bound and measurable goals and targets for combating poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination against women” (United Nations, 2000, 2002). The Millennium Development Goals (MDG), as this initiative has come to be known, and the eight key goals reflecting the essence of social determinants of development, provide a framework for the entire UN system and countries for which to strive with concerted efforts (UNMDG). In addition to investing global energy in MDG, the chronic global shortage of skilled health professionals also requires strong and simultaneous attention. Dr Lee Jong-wook, the late Director-General of the World Health Organization, stated in the November 2005 high-level forum in Paris, France, that “We have to work together to ensure access to a motivated, skilled, and supported health worker by every person in every village everywhere” (WHO, 2006). It is with the recognition of this global health human resource shortage that the 2006 WHO Report was dedicated to the exploration of global solutions to improve supply of and access to health workers (WHO, 2006).