African Healthcare Network: A Case Study on the Healthcare Supply Chain of Rwanda

A case study on the healthcare supply chain of the Rwanda Ministry of Health serving 11 million people.

The Republic of Rwanda’s Ministry of Health (MOH) was searching for a way to better manage the end-to-end fulfillment and delivery of medical supplies throughout the country. They chose One Network and South African-based partner Resolve to deliver a solution that is the first of its kind—a nationwide chain-of-custody pharmaceutical supply service for HIV/AIDS medications and other healthcare products for a country-wide network.

Key Facts About Rwanda’s Healthcare Supply Chain

The solution for Rwanda’s healthcare supply chain serves millions of people through hundreds of healthcare centers, hospitals and pharmacies. The solution had to connect these facilities digitally and help manage the flow of thousands of SKUs.

Serves a population of 11.78 million people
465 Local health centers
43 District Hospitals
30 District Pharmacies
4 Referral Hospitals
3000 SKUs approximately

Rwanda’s Healthcare Supply Chain Challenge

The MOH wanted to strengthen the forecasting and supply planning and logistics of all HIV/AIDS commodities and other Pharmaceutical and Health Products Management (PHPM), as well as support its programs at hospitals, distribution centers, district pharmacies, and healthcare facilities.

For the MOH, making accurate and timely delivery of critical pharmaceuticals to its people was difficult. The country is highly elevated, its population is predominantly rural, and power and internet outages are frequent.

Furthermore the MOH’s fulfillment system was largely paper-based and filled with manual processes. The MOH knew that to overcome
these challenges, they needed an easily accessible solution, that was easy to implement and deploy, and flexible enough to overcome the healthcare supply chain challenges of operating within the country.

Case Study in Healthcare Supply Chain Transformation: A Nationwide Digital Network for Medical Supply Distribution

Together with One Network and Resolve, and thanks to financial and strategic support from the Government of Rwanda, the MOH has been able to deliver an end-to-end backbone for Antiretroviral HIV/AIDs medications and other healthcare products to its population. The system covers the country’s central warehouses, 30 district pharmacies, and approximately 465 local health centers.

The system enables the MOH to manage and track in real time the custody and distribution of medical supplies as they flow from distribution centers, hospitals, and clinics, all the way to the individual patient.

The Rwanda MOH Healthcare Supply Chain at a Glance

A secure, nationwide healthcare supply chain network
Chain-of-custody ensures integrity of medicine
Visibility of consumption at the patient level
Supply chain-wide inventory management
Serialized item and lot tracking
Budgeting/Forecasting
Shipment visibility with event notifications
Order management and Replenishment
Reporting, dashboards, analytics
Integrated with existing WMS, ERP, and HMIS

Benefits of the Healthcare Supply Chain Network

The Ministry of Health has gained unprecedented visibility and control across its end-to-end healthcare supply chain while reducing total system cost to deploy, maintain, and support. Other benefits include reduced waste, and improved efficiencies via better supply chain management.