5) Description of health product/service offering: To improve the health of marginalized populations throughout the world, Medical Missions for Children (MMC) conceived of the Global Telemedicine & Teaching Network (GTTN). Their mission is to elevate the quality of care that is delivered to critically-ill children and adults in underserved parts of the world. Its goal is to enhance the medical capabilities of health providers in developing nations by providing access to trained medical specialists and to video-based educational materials that span a wide range of topics. The pressing social concern that is addressed by MMC’s is the disparity of medical care that exists between one part of the world and another.

The primary beneficiaries of MMC’s relief activities are:

- Seriously ill children and woman of child bearing years - Doctors and allied healthcare professionals who in the developing world

The main components of MMC’s GTTN are:

- The Telemedicine Outreach Program (TOP) – TOP links critically ill children and doctors in underserved communities with specialists located at any of our 27 tier- one mentoring hospitals. - The Medical Broadcasting Channel (MBC) - MBC broadcasts valuable medical video content to a satellite footprint capable of covering the entire globe on Intelsat satellites and via multicast on Internet2 and affiliated high-speed research and education networks. - The Global Video Library of Medicine (GVLM) - The GVLM is a searchable database designed to store more than 25,000 hours of medical video content used to feed MBC broadcasts. By the fourth quarter 2006, all content stored on the GVLM will be accessible to healthcare workers around the world on an “on-demand” basis via the internet. - The Giggles Children’s Theater – Giggles is an 80- seat theater located at St. Joseph’s Children’s Hospital in Paterson, NJ. It plays host to twice-weekly shows focused on entertaining and educating the children at St. Joseph’s.

6) Description of innovation: At Medical Missions for Children, we leverage telecommunications technology to support cross-boarder medicine like no other organization has. As opposed to the traditional medical mission model where an organization sends in a team of doctors to treat a sample of patients before heading home, MMC offers the ability to help thousands of critically ill children on a daily basis using a variety of videoconference and distance learning vehicles. Our approach is innovative for four fundamental reasons:

• Access to scarce medical resources – Too often, children in the developing world suffer needlessly from treatable illnesses because they rarely have access to well-trained specialists. We provide a direct link to these specialists, and children no longer have to wait for teams of doctors to visit them on a medical mission. • Availability to all children – MMC’s resources are available to all children, including the critically ill children who are often ignored due to the extreme difficulty of their cases. Traditional medical missions triage out the most seriously ill because it is difficult and expensive to travel with the necessary equipment and supplies. • Tier-one educational programming – MMC’s medical education programming draws from a variety of tier one hospitals, universities and research facilities. Our satellite broadcast system facilitates information dissemination to a much broader audience than in-country seminars or workshops. • Delivery of care is far more economical and efficient – A typical medical mission, with just four doctors treating fewer than 100 cases, can exceed $25,000. For $25,000, MMC can treat more than 200 children with highly specialized care and produce more than 100 hours of cutting-edge medical education programming.

7) Operational model: MMC’s primary focus is transferring medical knowledge from those who have it, to those who need it. We do this through our four aforementioned programs; TOP, MBC, GVLM, and Giggle’s Theater. Additionally, we currently are involved in the following separate initiatives that fall within the above four programs:

• Diagnostic Challenges – Working with the National Institutes of Health, MMC will be launching a program called Diagnostic Challenges. This program is aimed at solving the most severe pediatric cases. MMC the National Institutes of Health (including the National Library of Medicine), and the CDC will place a button on their respective websites which will link to a secure MMC server containing the medical records of each case. With more than 2 million hits per day, we’ll be challenging the best and brightest of the healthcare profession. • Biamba Marie Mutombo (BMM) Hospital, Kishasa, Congo – MMC is developing a telemedicine center at the BMM Hospital. With the addition of the MMC telemedicine center, the BMM Hospital will serve as a research and education hub for sub-Saharan Africa. • Angels of Medicine – Too often people take for granted the altruistic nature of healthcare professionals. That is why MMC is using 2008 to recognize the volunteer efforts of healthcare professionals with the Angels of Medicine Awards. This year-long publicity campaign will recognize those who go beyond the call of duty. • Volunteer Healthcare Worker Program – Access to care is one of the major issues facing the developing world. Many countries lack the basic infrastructure to allow citizens access to hospitals or health clinics. MMC is launching a pilot program in Guatemala modeled after volunteer fire departments in the US. Using a combination of distance and classroom learning, we will train citizens in a basic healthcare curriculum enabling each community to achieve sustainable gains in basic health indicators.

8) Human resources: MMC has a talented team of fifteen full time employees working toward the attainment of MMC’s charitable goals and objectives. The leaders of dynamic group include:

Frank Brady – Co-Founder/Chairman/CEO Peg Brady – Co-Founder, Executive Director The Brady’s have an extensive background in international business with a focus on work in developing countries. Following retirement in 1996, on behalf of the UN, they conceived of and founded the School of International Relations and Diplomacy at Seton Hall University. John Riehl – EVP/COO John Riehl joined MMC in June 2004 bringing 14 years of experience working both for and with non-profit organizations. Immediately prior to joining MMC, Mr. Riehl was Director of International Medical Services for AmeriCares. Ken Konikowski – CTO Aside from his role as CTO, Mr. Konikowski is also the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Digital Movers, LLC, a NJ-based eCommerce solutions provider. George Otto, PhD – VP, MBC/GVLM Prior to coming to work for MMC, Mr. Otto had a long career at Bell Labs and AT&T Research, working in such diverse areas as Artificial Intelligence, database design, multimedia development, and digital video.

9) Key operational partnerships: The partnerships MMC has developed have been critical to our success and have helped us impact the lives of tens of thousands of children. Some of our primary partners are:

St. Joseph’s Children’s Hospital – St. Joseph’s generously provides MMC with office space and telecommunications solutions. St. Joseph’s is also home to some of the key physicians that volunteer their time to the TOP.

Polycom, Inc. - In 1999 after winning a contest for the most innovative use of Polycom equipment, Frank and Peg Brady were introduced to Polycom CEO, Robert Hagerty. Since that day, Polycom and Robert Hagerty have been instrumental in the success of MMC, donating millions of dollars in hardware and software, as well as substantial cash donations used to develop the TOP.

Intelsat, Ltd. - Intelsat, Ltd. has partnered with MMC by donating all of MBC’s satellite time, allowing MBC to be broadcast to the 23 million physicians and nurses around the world.

Videobank Digital - Videobank is a software development company that specializes in media asset management and has developed the necessary tools for MBC to digitize, store, and broadcast all of our video content. Videobank has been an invaluable partner and key to the development of both MBC and the GVLM.

10) Financial Sustainability

          • Fees charged to clients?: No

          • How do you assure affordability?: Since its inception, MMC has developed the notion of “providing medical assistance to critically-ill children” into an organization capable of supporting the specialty care needs of over 100 children’s hospitals located in as many developing nations. Additionally, they have garnered the technical and human resources needed to develop a video-based global education program using satellite and Internet technologies. MMC has expanded its mission at a pace consistent with its ability to expand its donor base through gift-in-kind relationships with organizations such as Polycom, Intelsat, and VideoBank; service-in-kind relationship with more than 650 U.S.-based physicians; and financial contribution relationships with both private and public sector donors.

          • Earned incomes as a percentage of operating costs: 0

          • Other funding sources: Since its inception, MMC has developed the notion of “providing medical assistance to critically-ill children” into an organization capable of supporting the specialty care needs of over 100 children’s hospitals located in as many developing nations. Additionally, they have garnered the technical and human resources needed to develop a video-based global education program using satellite and Internet technologies. MMC has expanded its mission at a pace consistent with its ability to expand its donor base through gift-in-kind relationships with organizations such as Polycom, Intelsat, and VideoBank; service-in-kind relationship with more than 650 U.S.-based physicians; and financial contribution relationships with both private and public sector donors.

          • Strategy for long-term sustainability: To augment current development activities, MMC is introducing a sponsorship program to coincide with the global launch of MBC. Using the same business model that has been employed successfully by the Public Broadcast System and National Public Radio, they will seek new donor/sponsors by offering “on-air” announcements recognizing the generous support of contributors. Realizing that the target audience is made up of physicians and allied health professionals, MMC is focusing their marketing and solicitation activities on the Life Sciences and Biotechnology industries. Additionally, they will offer naming opportunities for those companies and individuals with the financial resources to underwrite the development of a video-based medical library.

11) Current and Future Impact

          • Total number of clients: 24640

          • Clients in the past year: 6414

          • Percentage of low-income clients: 100

          • Impact: There’s an old adage that says “Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.” It is this philosophy that is behind what MMC does with the TOP, MBC, and GVLM. Their aim is to teach healthcare workers about the newest developments in the field. The goal is to develop a mentoring relationship between physicians at our participating hospitals and universities and those health workers in underserved communities. Through instruction, these healthcare workers will elevate the level of medicine in their respective communities. MMC is helping these communities so that they may help themselves.

          • Overall "market": AIDS alone claims the lives of more than 1400 children each day. The majority of these cases stem from mother to child transmission. With proper education and medical interventions, the mother to child transmission rate falls below two percent. The region hardest hit by this pandemic is sub-Saharan Africa. The expansion of the MMC Telemedicine program into Africa combined with the educational programming of MBC will have a direct impact on this growing pandemic, conceivably saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of children each year. With the mortality rate for children under the age of five continuing to grow in many areas, this is a problem that must be addressed immediately. With an increase in access to care, simple, yet effective treatments are within reach for all children.

12) Scaling up strategy

          • Stage of the initiative: Scaling Up stage.

          • Expansion plan: MMC will focus on the expansion of technology and human resource infrastructures to facilitate the dissemination of medical information. It is believed that with the current rate of medical breakthroughs, the amount of information available to the public will double in the next five years. Without a delivery vehicle, the benefit of these breakthroughs will be limited. MMC expects that MBC will be the delivery vehicle, and that it will be viewed by the medical community as an unimpeachable source with high retention rates. By continuing to expand the network, MMC expects that in three years they will facilitate 50,000 telemedicine sessions per year and that MBC will impact five million children annually.

MMC is proposing to put a satellite on each hospital in the US. They would use this configuration to deliver programming and to perform telemedicine consultations. This would also be an emergency communications network in the event of natural disaster, terrorist attack, or pandemic outbreak. Within 15 minutes, they could turn the network over to authorities. MMC currently has an appropriations bill before Congress to fund a pilot program involving 10 hospitals.

13) Policy change: In countries like Armenia, Bolivia, and The Democratic Republic of Congo, the requirement does not currently exist for continuing medical education for physicians and nurses. Consequently, medical knowledge amongst practicing physicians in these nations quickly becomes dated, rendering doctors and their staffs minimally effective when treating conditions that fall outside of the norm. The desire and ability of governing bodies in developing nations to impose a continuing medical education and re- certification requirement would dramatically accelerate social change while also significantly improving clinical outcomes amongst the infirm populations they serve. MMC could then serve as the primary source of the medical information needed to conduct the continuing medical education and re-certification seminars.

14) Origin of the initiative: As an infant, Frank Brady was diagnosed with spinal meningitis and given little hope for survival. He became one of the first pediatric patients given penicillin, and quickly recovered. Mr. Brady has never forgotten the impact that medical breakthroughs had on his life. Following his retirement from a career in international business, he answered his calling to help critically-ill children. In 1999, he and his wife Peg founded MMC as a way to reach out to children who were suffering from illnesses for which cures are readily available in the developed world. The Brady’s had the foresight to recognize disparity of care long before it became a buzzword in the medical community. They knew that a viable solution was lying in the world of emerging technology and saw MMC as a way to leverage these technologies to help children and educate doctors in developing countries.

Contact Information:
Frank  Brady
Founder/Chairman
Medical Missions for Children
(Not-for-profit)
United States
Website: www.mmissions.org