SES deploys second SATMED e-Health Platform in Benin

SES, a global satellite operator, announced deployment of a SATMED e-health platform at Centre de Dépistage et de traitement de l’Ulcère de Buruli in Allada, Benin, to improve awareness and healthcare. The SATMED e-health platform was conceived by SES Techcom Services, a wholly owned subsidiary of SES, and funded by the Luxembourg Government and the Ministry for Cooperation and Humanitarian Action. The first deployment of SATMED in Benin successfully took place at the remote maternity hospital of Ahozonnoude in June 2014.

The new satellite-based platform in Allada will be used by Fondation Follereau Luxembourg to communicate with doctors and medical experts around the world, access online training tools, and establish facilities such as video conferencing, data collection and analysis. The deployment is part of FFL’s efforts to establish a consultation office at CDTUB – which treated more than 700 patients in 2015, to improve communication between patients and medical staff, raising further awareness of tropical diseases.

“We are pleased to partner with SES for this important project, which will allow early detection of symptoms in patients, significantly improving treatment and recovery rate,” said Violaine Alves, Project Manager at FFL. “Buruli ulcer is often hard to detect by untrained people, particularly by the patients themselves or their parents, so raising awareness in the community with SATMED will be of utmost benefit.”

SES Techcom Services CEO Gerhard Bethscheider added, “SATMED has already been deployed at a number of locations across Africa to improve the speed and quality of healthcare services. In remote locations such as CDTUB, satellite is often the only means of providing consistent communication between sites, and we are proud to have been able to provide our solution to FFL in Allada.”

SES Techcom Services is a wholly owned affiliate of SES, providing integrated end-to-end satellite solutions and operational services tailored to customers’ needs worldwide.

In 2014 SES announced its commitment to action, in the form of the e-health platform SATMED. SATMED is an e-Health platform conceived by SES TechCom and supported by the Luxembourg Government and the Directorate for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Action.

The satellite-enhanced and cloud-computing based telemedicine platform aims to improve the access to and simplify the use of e-health. SATMED will provide a range of e-health services at different levels including:

• Satellite connectivity for remote areas with no internet connectivity
• E-health and m-health tools developed with the support of doctors
• Tools developed by international communities for providing universal access to e-care, e-learning, e-health administration, and e-health financing
• Provide access to cloud services for secure data storage, exchange, and data backup

SES is developing SATMED in close cooperation with several Non-Governmental Organisations namely Friendship, German Doctors, Médecins Sans Frontières, Archemed, and Fondation Follerau Luxembourg.

Up to 15 satellite terminals will be installed at various project locations in Bangladesh, Benin, Eritrea, Guinea, Philippines, Sierra Leone. Partner organisations will use SATMED to improve access to medical care, reinforce their medical training programmes, make health management more effective and quality assured, and/or upgrade their collection, management, and visualisation of data.