Precision Medicine Is Transforming the Future Of Healthcare In Africa

Imagine a world where people have agency over their health, their time, and their money. A place where every person has the dignity of choice over where they live, work, and play. Visualize hospitals as being places we visit not only when we are sick, but to stay healthy. Picture a society where we all use our energy collectively to leave the world in a slightly better place than where we found it the day before. INUWELL, an innovative wellness ecosystem, hopes to make this seemingly utopian world a reality through precision medicine.

Precision medicine to shift health from reactive to proactive

This past week we joined a meeting of minds where we were afforded valuable insights into the future of healthcare in Africa. The healthcare system currently operates on a sick-care model and a “one size fits all” approach which has proven to be ineffective. Accordingly, there is a growing need for personalized treatment, and technological and digital advancements may be the tool in its emergence.

Dr. Kamlen Pillay

The Institute of Universal Wellcare (INUWELL), strategically situated at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, was established to introduce precision medicine by building a bridge between the physical world at the digital world (also known as the metaverse). Dr. Kamlen Pillay, founder of SCINMed and the InUversal Group, shared that closing the gap between the two can pave the way for shifting the paradigm of how we think about health.

Chalandra Naidoo, entrepreneur and tech founder from the InUversal Group

“We only visit hospitals when we fall ill; positioning a hospital in a mall will be the conduit to bring people into the area of precision medicine, and it opens the opportunity for people to reevaluate their thinking around being healthy,” discussed Dr. Pillay

Have a positive impact

Ian Fuhr, founder of the Sorbet Group and the Hatch Institute and 3x author, imparted key business lessons from his impressive 48-year entrepreneurial career. Fuhr values building a culture within his businesses that reinforces a sense of belonging amongst all its stakeholders. This is rooted in his longstanding passion for fighting social injustice and serving his community after he was exposed to the unfair socio-economic environment of the apartheid era in South Africa. Fuhr expressed that his competitive advantage is the attitude of his staff towards serving others and making them feel like they belong.

“You get into business to have a positive impact on the lives of people, and if you do that the money will follow,” asserted Fuhr.

Serving people and having a transformational impact on their vitality is the motivation behind INUWELL’s pioneering methodology for wellness. However, their approach may appear audacious, and few people are aware of its capacity to revolutionize health as we know it. Fuhr asserted that courage, intuition, and believing in the fruition of one’s vision – despite a lack of evidence – are crucial to success. Accordingly, INUWELL has been bold and solution-driven in reimagining a flawed and unquestioned healthcare system as one that is based on precision medicine.

Recreating wellness through gamification

Ósìnàkáchì Ákùmà Kálù (founder of TAFFD’s and various other groundbreaking initiatives) is a visionary leader who is pushing boundaries to combat biological aging, particularly in Africa through his Afrolongevity initiative. We will be interviewing him for the upcoming Wellness Wednesday, where we will dissect his other initiatives in more detail. Kálù has been examining the psychogenics of aging, i.e., how mental perceptions and stressors can affect physical health. It prompted his interest in precision medicine and how it uses technology.

Ósìnàkáchì Ákùmà Kálù

Kálù discussed gamification and its relevance within the realm of health. Gamification is the application of game elements (such as points, levels, challenges, and feedback) to non-game contexts. These include health behaviors, education, and work. According to research, gamification in wellness has a variety of potential benefits. It can motivate and engage people in several ways. People may feel inclined to adopt healthy behaviors, learn new skills, and achieve their goals in a fun and socially interactive way.

Virtual reality can democratize access to healthier habits

Gamification is used in a number of health and fitness-related apps. Nike Run Club encourages people to run more and helps them track their progress. Mango Health assists people with monitoring their food habits and learning about healthy eating. These apps can offer better self-management skills, improved dietary habits, and disease prevention, amongst other things. Nevertheless, gamification can pose some limitations.

The challenge lies in designing effective and engaging gamification interventions that suit the needs and preferences of different users. Kálù highlighted the importance of using personalized games to tackle every individual’s unique issues more effectively. INUWELL’s goal is to apply virtual reality (VR) and AI to personalize gamification methods that support an individual’s healing.

Bringing the research on precision medicine into the medical domain

Dr. Shruti Singh, a biochemist and Ph.D. holder, informed on the concept of integrative health. Its application is personalized and preventative in nature. Dr. Singh is a founding director of the International Foundation for Integrative Medical Research (iFIMR), which pursues the interconnectedness of physiological, social, and emotional health. iFIMR understands that the human body is a complex ecosystem of cells and biomes and that the gut-brain axis is vital to our health. Sadly, our modern-day lifestyles have led to dysbiosis (the degradation of the biome in our gut) and, in turn, disease.

Dr Shruti Singh

The Human Genome Project (launched in 1990 and completed in 2003) formed part of an exciting era in healthcare research. The focus was on precision medicine, which involved the right treatment for the right patient at the right time. However, the healthcare system never implemented the groundbreaking research obtained. Consequently, an epidemic of lifestyle-related diseases quickly burdened modern medicine. iFIMR aims to correct this. The advancements in diagnostic technology can apply this research to the medical and wellness domain.

INUWELL will be using iFIMR to foster collaboration between clinicians, researchers, and patients. Scientific knowledge will be accessible to physicians working in the INUWELL facilities to help implement innovative solutions to our health problems.

“Wellcare” is the new and improved healthcare

Dr. Kathleen Green, a business specialist, informed on INUWELL’s provision of “wellcare” instead of healthcare. “Wellcare” is integrative in application and has three main components (biological health, psychological health, and social environmental health). This new form of healthcare will support these critical elements of our health. Therefore, INUWELL will leverage the transformative impact of cutting-edge technology and data.

Dr Kathleen Green

We can already see the surfacing of different technologies. These have adequately provided an abundance of data in the health space. Today, digital and telemedicine are popular where remote consultations can occur between patients and physicians. Surgeons are using VR headsets. Imagine connecting with different experts across the globe and observing exactly how you can plan your surgery. AI and machine learning can enable a doctor’s ability to predict your risk for certain ailments. INUWELL aspires to integrate these various data sources and make sense of it all to apply precision medicine correctly.

“We have all of this data, but we now have the mathematics and the tools to be able to understand it and give people personalized care,” explains Dr. Green.

The Bottom line

INUWELL embodies a daring and innovative vision. They see the need to shift our view on health from reactive to proactive through precision medicine and advanced technologies. The first step is to start building opportunities. That way, people can engage with these pioneering methods in their facilities. Creating a sense of trust and excitement is essential. Hopefully, people will become inspired to see what is happening with wellness and technology. Ultimately, they may feel a calling to take control of their health now.