A smartphone application has been designed and launched in South Africa which proves to be a pocket doctor for the ones who can afford to buy the mobile phone. A technology company based in Cape Town, Blueworld communities has created the virtual health clinic called Afridoctor.

The application features a “snapdiagnosis” service, wherein a patient is allowed to send photos of his ailments to the doctors who will then diagnose it and reply within 48 hours. Werner Erasmus, the creator of the application said, “It is more for external use – like dermatology – for things like a bee sting or a snake bite and you don’t know what to do or how to diagnose it”.

Afridoctor includes other features like “distress” and “find a doctor” and also a symptom checker and first aid tips as well. “Find a doctor” makes use of Google maps to locate the local health services geographically which includes hospitals, emergency clinics and doctors. On the other hand distress feature allows the users to contact a friend or family member, all with a touch of a button.
Although the application has been created in Africa, it is far gaining popularity outside the continent too.

Mr. Erasmus said, “All the requests we tend to get for snapdiagnosis are from overseas. There have so far been 20,000 downloads of the app”. “With the snapdiagnosis, we haven’t had that much feedback because most people in Africa don’t have smartphones – they’re using second generation mobile phones.”

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