Vodafone Group revealed digital healthcare tools developed by its Egyptian unit are now deployed by 314 local hospitals and benefit more than 6 million patients, as the operator plans to serve 26 million citizens with the solutions within the next few years.

In an announcement, the company explained it launched its digital health services through a nationwide project aimed at improving access to healthcare and digitalising the operations of Egyptian University hospitals.

As part of the project, Vodafone Egypt provided hospitals with digital Hospital Information Systems (HIS), a solution to enable online payment systems and electronic health records, streamlining administrative and management processes.

The operator claimed deployment of HIS at a Cairo-based teaching hospital has “reduced average patient waiting times by 32 per cent and cut the re-admission rates by nearly 63 per cent”.

It also saved “more than 50 million Egyptian pounds” thanks to the application of integrated digital services, while helping administrative tasks become fully “paperless”.

Vodafone Egypt set a target to digitally transform a further 90 teaching hospitals across 13 universities nationwide, noting it offers technical training to hospital staff to ensure a smooth transition to modern digital services.

It said its desire to provide digital health solutions to 26 million Egyptians, or around 22 per cent of the country’s population, “represents one of the largest digital transformation projects” in Egypt.

Vodafone claimed its business arm has “a strong track record in helping university hospitals” transition to digital services, pointing to a European Union (EU) funded project with the Frankfurt University Hospital launched in April 2023.