KENYA – CarePay, a platform that supports private and public health plans with smart mobile health wallets to provide access to good healthcare has lent out US$18.24 million to private healthcare facilities last year, largely to fund acquisition of essential equipment and expansion.
The loan facility, under CarePay’s medical credit fund (MCF), saw disbursements go up from about US$456204 per month by the third quarter in 2020 to more than US$3.65 million a month in the fourth quarter.
“We used our data on medical care expenses made via our platform, M-tiba, to create a financial history that enables the participating private hospitals to qualify for the loans based on a repay-per-use basis,” CarePay chief executive Moses Kuria said.
The beneficiaries used the loans to set up pharmacies and an online prescription platform as well as enhance their ability to offer primary healthcare, where patients pay via the M-tiba cashless wallet, which was developed by CarePay, PharmAccess and telecommunication company Safaricom.
The disbursement of loans, he said, saw participating facilities rise to 3,100 as of December 31, 2020 compared to 2,500 facilities registered in 2019.
“We used our data on medical care expenses made via our platform, M-tiba, to create a financial history that enables the participating private hospitals to qualify for the loans based on a repay-per-use basis”
Moses Kuria – CEO, CarePay
The M-tiba platform is currently being used by the National Hospital Insurance Fund of Kenya (NHIF), Britam and AAR insurance companies in Kenya where payments made at participating hospitals are sanctioned by customers who review each claim before releasing payments and a real-time report made to their underwriter or employer.
Mr Kuria spoke when the released results of a nationwide survey the firm commissioned on effect of Covid-19 pandemic on Kenyans’ spending.
The survey revealed an appetite for healthcare micro-insurance products that ride on mobile phones technology where spending on medical care is cashless and affordable.
CarePay is a Kenyan company that administers conditional healthcare payments between funders, patients, and healthcare providers.
Through their M-TIBA platform, CarePay directs funds from public and private funders directly to patients into a “health wallet” on their mobile phone.
The use of these funds is restricted to conditional spending at selected healthcare providers across Kenya.
With every transaction, CarePay combines the digital payment with real time medical and financial data collection, to help make healthcare safer and more transparent for both patients and healthcare providers.
CarePay has contracted more than 2,000 healthcare facilities across Kenya, with an ambition to drive healthcare inclusion for millions of Kenyans.
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