Nanziri a genius in health related applications

Bonita Beatrice Nanziri is a mother, entrepreneur, mentor and innovator with a desire to change the world and make it a safe place for vulnerable women, youth and children. 

As such she is deeply passionate about health technology and uses her skills to increase access to healthcare services in low resource settings.  Her biggest concern is sickle cell patients who are diagnosed late in life due to scarcity of diagnostic tools. 

At 28 years, Nanziri has a patent registered in Uganda and in the USA for mDex, a smartphone-based sickle cell diagnostic tool.

Nanziri is also a Global Health Corps alumni, a Grace Hopper Fellow 2014, a Tedx speaker, a Microsoft Patent Program pioneer and a switch point speaker.

Due to her impactful innovation, she led the team that won the national finals of Imagine Cup 2014 and went on to represent Uganda at the World Finals in Seattle, USA.

She shared her story with Jacquiline Nakandi;
Growing up in an entrepreneurial family nurtured business mindset in Nanziri. They had a rule at home, ‘if you do not work, you do not eat'.

Her parents were poultry farmers and each child had to take part in the rearing of the birds. At sale time, each was paid according to their input. That upbringing strengthened her work ethic.

Starting out
Nanziri started her career while at university; she used to install operating systems and drivers for people. 

She then interned with Kenya Ferry Services in Mombasa in the IT department which opened her eyes to advanced IT systems.

"Everything was automated from ferry ticket generation to troubleshooting systems on the island (Mombasa) and the mainland (Likoni)," she states.

"I got a chance to experience how these different systems work. The experience built my confidence to work with different systems no matter how complicated they seemed," she explains.

On return, Nanziri was the IT guru at her church, from which she earned an allowance.   
Towards her final year, she joined an online shopping business as a sales person signing up small businesses to the platform.

While awaiting graduation, she got a six-months internship work with a Tanzanian based organisation that was implementing NetDocuments, a Document Management System for law firms.

"I was providing end user support and system configuration for their clients, hwo are a law firm in Kampala," she says.

Nanziri would also set up meetings for her boss with potential clients in Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya.
This improved her cross border relation skills as it was her job to engage the clients before her boss would fly in to do a demo.

After graduation, she was recommended for a job at an IT sales firm, to set up their enterprise department.

"My job was to set up a software production arm for the company as well as creating internal products for sale to similar companies. I set up a team of four to execute the task with," she explains.

In the same company, Nanziri suggested a document management system because she noticed paper was being wasted.

"The system only printed the final copy of the document and the rest was electronically done," she explains. 

She has worked with several people to create systems such as a loan management system for money lending businesses and an attendance tracking system for the Ministry of Health headquarters. 
"The former remind debtors of upcoming payments," she explains.

Nanziri also led the team that piloted the rollout of biometrics to track attendance of health workers in select districts in eastern Uganda.

While at university, she also sold shoes to boost what her parents provided.

Going solo
The entire time, Nanziri says, she was working on her startup. After her last job at the firm, she decided to focus on going solo.

In 2014, after losing a friend to sickle cell disease, she decided to develop an application for it.

"On starting, I did research about the disease and discovered that some people thought it was witchcraft. The other challenge was there was no access to diagnostic services.

"Given my soft engineering background, I thought it better to use my technological skills to find a solution. That was when mDex was born," she explains.

The application won grants and awards
How she balances all the roles
"The most important thing is doing something you love. I am a passion-driven individual and for anything that I am passionate about and decide to pursue, I will come up with a strategy, identify people to build the dream with and then build systems," she explains.

She adds "I cannot say that I am able to do all this on my own, I work with teams of people that are sold to the dreams I envision". In regard to volunteerism, Nanziri says she lives by the principle of ‘paying it forward!'

"The universe has been so kind to me; a lot of people have held my hand, at some point they have pushed opportunities my way and I may not be able to pay them in turn. So whenever I get an opportunity to pay it forward, I will do so," she states.

It never feels like work to her because she loves doing what she does.
However, she explains that she takes some time off to recharge her batteries because life has taught her that "you cannot pour from an empty cup."

How she faces challenges
Life is never smooth and only dead fish go with the flow. Nanziri says she has faced a number of challenges ranging from burnout, to thinking she's not enough.

"My journey has been fun, challenging but worth every bit.  I love challenges, what I am and have accomplished is because someone dared to say that I cannot do, or I cannot become," she explains.
Nanziri believes that she was created to solve problems.

She says when she walks into a room, the first thing that crosses her mind is, this can be better.
"I also believe that I can do or accomplish anything once I set my mind to it," she states.

Her inspiration
Nanziri say while growing up, she did not have female role models to look up to in the fields she aspired to excel in.

However, at one point she looked up to Justice Julia Sebutinde because she believed she broke the status quo and was shaking tables at the time.

She then discovered that Winnie Byanyima was an aeronautical engineer whom she had only previously known as a politician.

"Because of such ladies, I want to be a success model for girls who think they cannot make it because of their gender. I want them to see or hear about me and say when I grow up, I want to be like her," she explains.

She adds that she wants to create a new generation of female role models for girls that want to pursue careers in Science Technology Engineering and Maths (STEM).

What keeps her going?
"I have a tendency of stalking people I look up to, admire or aspire to be like. I will ask for a lunch or coffee date with a business person I admire so as to pick their mind on how they have made it," she explains.

Nanziri adds that this has kept her afloat. Each meetup reminds her that all dreams can be achieved if you are willing to put in the effort and do it right.

"God is my biggest source of inspiration, as well as nature. I am a sunset and sunrise hunter; to me that represents new beginnings," she says.

 Advice to young women
"You can be whatever you want to be. Every dream can be achieved no matter how crazy it looks," she says, adding that sometimes our dreams are futuristic; relevant but not for present times.

When she came up with the idea of having mobile phones in health facilities with low health resource setting, it took the government five years to roll it out.

"Your dream could be in the building season of your life. A lot of things may not make sense, but keep on the grind. Don't give up, pivot, adapt and innovate but never give up," she states.

Family background
Nanziri is the fourth of seven children born to Mr and Mrs David Balamaze.  She grew up in Mutundwe and has been in church ministry for as long as she can remember.

She taught Sunday school, directed Christmas productions, started a youth service and led the media team at St Mark's Church Mutundwe.

Nanziri attended Buganda Road Primary School, Lubiri High School for O'level and  Lubiri SS for A'level.

How the app works
 According to the Innovation Hub website, mDex is a smartphone-based, low-cost, reusable, near instant point of care diagnostic tool aimed at increasing access to sickle cell diagnostic services in low resourced areas.

It is aimed at bridging the knowledge gap and the feedback loop between the time of testing and results. This equips medical personnel with no hematology skills to diagnose sickle cell disease accurately to facilitate early diagnosis, thus reducing mortality rates.

How does your innovation work?

•    A medical practitioner prepares a blood slide
•    With a lens attached to the phone camera, they launch mDex app in order to capture patient details.
•    They are prompted to take a picture of the blood slide.
•    There's an option of retaking the picture to ensure quality.
•    The picture is then analysed and results displayed on the phone.