Rice Student Medha Pulluru Discusses Healthcare Tech At UNGA Symposium
India-West News Desk
SOUTH ORANGE, NJ – Rice University student entrepreneur Medha Pulluru spoke at the 6th UNGA Digital Health Symposium in September about bringing healthcare technology beyond hospitals and closer to patients in their homes and communities.
The two-day symposium, held Sept. 22-23 at Seton Hall University in association with Maynooth University, took place during United Nations General Assembly Week. It brought together leaders from healthcare, technology, academia and government to discuss artificial intelligence, patient-centered care and digital health systems.
Pulluru participated in an international plenary titled “Healthcare Innovation in Low-Resource Settings: The Digital and AI Advantage,” alongside speakers working in Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Bangladesh, Egypt, Kenya, Nepal and Indonesia.
She spoke about the need to “digitize the edge of healthcare,” arguing that technology should reach patients where they live and receive care, rather than remain focused on hospitals.
“Healthcare has spent years digitizing the hospital, but the patient doesn’t live in the hospital,” Pulluru said. “The next question is how we bring that same intelligence closer to the patient — into their homes, their communities and the places where care is actually happening every day.”
The issue is particularly important in low-resource settings, where hospitals and physicians may be hours away and frontline health workers often serve as the first point of contact for patients.
Pulluru drew on her work with AfyaQuest, a nonprofit she co-founded to develop healthcare technology alongside frontline workers in low-resource communities. The organization’s work has extended to Kenya, Guatemala and Colombia, helping health workers triage patients, communicate medical information and identify cases that need a higher level of care.
“You can’t build from assumptions,” Pulluru said. “You have to understand how care is already happening, what resources people actually have and what information would make a difference in that moment.”
