Moving Health Announces Launch of New Ambulance Design.

March 23rd, 2023
 

Moving Health, a nonprofit that designs, builds, and distributes motorcycle ambulances to provide safe and reliable medical transport in rural Ghana, announces the launch of a new ambulance design. The organization spent two years collecting Ghanaian user feedback, then incorporated that information into designing and building a vehicle that patients trust to transport them to receive medical care.  

The vehicle is a tricycle ambulance, leveraging the most common mode of transportation in the rural areas of the country. The design features a removable stretcher for the patient, seats for family members and medical personnel, as well as basic life support options.  

The new ambulance is the country’s first Ghanaian Made Tricycle Ambulance, empowering local fabricators and suppliers and building economic growth. The organization’s manufacturing team, located in Sissala East district, worked with master fabricators in Suame Magazine to develop the final design. The vehicles are now ready to be sold and deployed to new partners in the country.  

This is the latest step forward after Moving Health completed their pilot in Ghana, where they provided access to emergency transportation to about 10,000 people. Out of over 230 rides to the hospital, nearly 50% of those patients were women with pregnancy-related complications. All mothers and babies survived. These outcomes are in line with the Ghanaian Ministry of Health’s 2022 goal of improving emergency transport—and, ultimately, health care outcomes—in the country. Lack of transportation is one of the top two reasons people do not receive medical care globally. 

In addition to designing and manufacturing the tricycle ambulances, Moving Health works with the Local Health Directorate and Local National Ambulance Service to help create sustainable last-mile dispatch. They deploy ambulances in the rural communities, shortening refferal time to the hospital by up to 50%, and creating a trusted and reliable system that works alongside the National Ambulance Service to boost the accesibility of ambulances in rural areas. 

Moving Health (formerly called The Okoa Project), is a six year old nonprofit founded by three women engineers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Moving Health’s mission statement is: “We envision a world that allows every family to be connected to the healthcare they need, when they need it.”