Véna Arielle Ahouansou

An Administrative Problem With Deadly Consequences

One evening in 2016 in the West African country of Benin, a young woman named Charlotte gave birth to twins. During the birth, she suffered a hemorrhage—a relatively rare but potentially fatal complication—and urgently required a blood transfusion. Tragically, despite being in a modern suburban hospital and having had blood type testing during pregnancy, her test results were inaccessible to doctors during the delivery. They struggled for ten minutes to determine her blood type—a time too short for the doctors and too long for Charlotte. She died before she could receive a transfusion.

Tying Together Patients, Doctors, and Hospitals to Save Lives (and Money)

Dr. Vèna Arielle Ahouansou was Charlotte’s doctor. The young mother’s death highlighted the potentially tragic consequences of life-threatening gaps in patient information. Vèna conceived Kea’s platform as a solution, not only for women giving birth but for patients entering the hospital after an accident or illness. “A matter of a few minutes can cost a life,” she says. The company aims to connect all health systems in the Republic of Benin through a single database so any doctor in any hospital can immediately access life-saving health data.

The system’s foundation is the information patients provide when they join Kea’s universal medical identification system (IMU). The IMU is one of two complementary solutions. The other is an integrated information system aimed at hospitals that lets patients carry out activities such as paying bills and lets a hospital connect its system with other hospitals.

It’s not only patients who suffer. Lack of access to health data affects the whole value chain, Vèna explains. “In the worst case, the patient can die.” Also, doctors lose time that could be devoted to treatment and hospital staff wastes time manually searching record systems (which costs hospitals money as well). Health insurers can use Kea to combat waste and fraud; for example, an unethical patient might visit different hospitals to seek treatment for the same condition or to obtain drugs to sell on the black market. Finally, a disconnected and inaccessible health system prevents the government from gathering accurate data to inform decisions. “We are creating an interconnection that ensures all the stakeholders can talk to each other and don’t need to switch from one platform to another,” Vèna says.

The First Step in Creating an Equitable Health System

Since 2017, Kea has reached 115,000 patients, 62 health facilities, and 1,700 health workers, with plans to expand to other African countries and eventually globally. Vèna sees the company’s initial solutions as the first step in its mission to create an equitable health system that gives everyone access to good care. Currently, only about 15 percent of the population in most African countries can afford insurance. “At the end of the day, insurance companies can decrease costs to make insurance accessible to everyone,” Vèna says. “Kea will contribute to economic growth because more people will be able to save money and invest in their own life. In ten years we are hoping that 100 million people can have access to good quality of care.”

Beyond Good Health to a Better Life

Vèna’s bigger vision is to help every human being to achieve their life’s goals—something that is possible only when people first have good health care. “This is a life mission for me,” she says. “I discovered by doing a small thing, it can help improve millions of lives.” And if it can save just one child from losing a mother unnecessarily, Kea will have fulfilled Vèna’s dream.