NextGenU.org and ReelDx Partner to Enable Sudanese Medical Residents to Create Peer-Reviewed Video Case Studies

SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwired - Sep 10, 2014) - NextGenU.org, the world's first portal to free, accredited higher education, and ReelDx, the leading hosting platform for creating and sharing HIPAA-compliant clinical video, today announced at the TEDMED 2014 conference a partnership to support NextGenU's family practice residency program in Sudan. ReelDx will provide its cloud-based platform to enable Sudanese family medicine residents to create video case studies that will be peer reviewed and shared via ReelDx's medical education application.

Physician shortages are a global problem. The World Health Organization estimates a shortage of 4.3 million physicians, nurses and other health workers worldwide, especially in many developing countries. The issue is particularly acute in civil war-scarred Sudan and neighboring South Sudan, where millions are forced to rely on inadequately trained or low-skilled health workers, especially in rural areas. Hospitals are often overcrowded, infant mortality rates often high and, at less than 62 years, life expectancy is low.

To help address the issue, the government-backed Sudanese Family Medicine Residency aims to dramatically increase the number of family medicine doctors who practice in Sudan. When the program started, there were 10 family medicine doctors in the country, which has a population of about 35 million. This program expects to train an additional 10,000 doctors in five years' time. NextGenU is providing its online educational platform to bring residents a distributed and high-quality curriculum.

"We had been looking for a way to empower residents to create and share case studies," said Dr. Erica Frank, Founder and President of NextGenU. "When we saw the ReelDx platform, we realized this was a fabulous way to go. It takes advantage of video capabilities in the hands of the residents, online distribution (a fundamental principle of NextGenU), and a structured peer review process to ensure the highest-quality finished product."

The Sudanese Family Medicine Residency pilot program began in 2013. Residents will begin creating video case studies on ReelDx immediately. The NextGenU-ReelDx partnership is expected to produce over 250,000 video case studies over the next five years. These cases will dramatically increase the efficiency of the residency program by exposing residents to a wide variety of clinical situations, and the cases will become a valuable source of data about the status and practice of health and medicine in Sudan.

Once the program is successful in this first implementation, NextGenU and ReelDx plan to make it available to other similar programs throughout the world.

"ReelDx is thrilled to team up with NextGenU in implementing such an honorable program that has the potential to have incredible impact on the Sudanese people," said Bill Kelly, co-founder and CEO of ReelDx. "This is a perfect way to demonstrate the power of clinical video for record keeping, patient engagement and medical education."

Backing the Sudanese Family Medicine Residency is the government of the Sudanese state of Gezira, through the Ministries of Health and Telecommunications, along with the Faculty of Medicine, University of Gezira, and the Sudanese Association of Family Medicine.

"We now have a strong tool with NextGenU and ReelDx to scale our program up," said Dr. Abdelnasir Ahmed Abuzied, president of the Sudanese Association of Family Medicine. "We are enthusiastic to see how using the platform to link this enormously expanding cohort of Sudanese family doctors to each other, and to the global community of practice in family medicine, will improve lives in Sudan."

NextGenU's curriculum is designed to support the World Health Organization's criteria for family medicine. The program is designed to respond to WHO's call for an increase in the number of healthcare professionals available throughout the world.

About NextGenU.org
NextGenU.org is the world's first portal where anyone, anywhere can get free, accredited, higher education. For now we concentrate our trainings (courses, residencies, continuing medical education, etc.) primarily in the health sciences, using expert-created competencies and resources. We work in partnership with experts and professional organizations for quality assurance and endorsement, and use cutting-edge educational innovations, including computer-based learning resources, and local and web-based peer and mentoring experiences. www.nextgenu.org. Contact NextGenU.org at EFrank@NextGenU.org or 604/442-2141 to learn more.

About ReelDx
ReelDx^® uses a HIPAA-compliant, cloud-based platform to enable the secure and easy creation, storage and sharing of Personal Clinical Video™. The company's vision is to enable the use of video to enhance medical education, provider-patient communication and the overall quality of medicine practiced at the human level. ReelDx Education offers curated and peer-reviewed libraries of video-based real patient case studies captured by providers in clinical settings, and by medical first responders in the field. Contact ReelDx at info@reeldx.com or 855-697-3353 to learn more.