This week was a reminder to me on far we still have to come in this world.  Seeing the clinic in Sierra Leone was not a surprise to me. I knew that clinics in developing world weren't very technological advanced. However, there was something about seeing the contrasts of hospitals in the U.S. and the clinic in Sierra Leone that made me upset. It reminded me that even though a lot of progress has been made in advancing healthcare in developing countries, there is still a lot more progress that can be made.

It also got me thinking on why the conditions aren't better. Being a student in the technology field, I immediately noticed how records still are being written on paper. I know someone would say to me what do you expect. I truly expected there to be a computer where records were kept. The truth is that computers are increasingly cheap. It probably would cost less in the long haul to have a computer store the data than keeping track of thousands of papers.

I also saw a major opportunity with computer records and the problem of high patient to nurse ratio that I observed in the video of Sierra Leone. Thinking of computers and the lines of patients, I remembered a conversation I had with my uncle who works for WHO in which he told me that I'd be surprised to know how many people have cell phones in developing countries. I started to imagine apps that video record patients or ask for symptoms and then there'd professionals on the other end who could give recommendations to patients. I thought of apps that could then performs machine learning algorithms on the data to give more and more accurate diagnosis without the need for highly trained doctors.

I think what I will ultimately take away from this week is the potential of computing technologies to help advance healthcare in developing countries. What is obvious is that even with all the advances, there is still a lack of skilled healthcare professionasl and economic infrastructure to meet the demand for healthcare. Computing apps can help scalable solve this problem like they have helped scalable solve problems in other industries.