Felix Davis ’26 was in medical school in his native Ghana when he learned that the woman who raised him, Mary Dagadu, had stage two breast cancer, a disease that can be effectively treated if caught early.
But for Dagadu, and for the nearly 44% of the Ghanaian population living in rural areas, access to basic medical care means traveling long distances, often on foot, leaving family and work behind, and finding the financial means to cover these costs, Davis says.
To illustrate what that means in terms of patient care, Davis pointed out that more the 50% of cancer cases among breastfeeding mothers are diagnosed at stage III or stage IV.
“This leads to poorer outcomes and survival rates,” Davis says.
Moreover, many of the medical centers outside the capital city of Accra may not be equipped to diagnose their ailment. The country is pushing to expand the number of hospitals across the country, but expansion is difficult for the West African country to afford, he says.
“I was in medical school at the time—the first ever in my family to get that opportunity,” Davis says. “I was actively talking with Mary and she was constantly supporting me, but I didn’t have any idea of her diagnosis.”
After Dagadu died from the cancer, Davis decided to leave medical school in Accra and come to Dartmouth, where he is studying computer science and economics. He has also connected with the John Sloan Dickey Center for International understanding, the Magnuson Center for Entrepreneurship, and other faculty and staff at Dartmouth offering a range of resources to assist his vision.
Davis’ goal: Developing low-cost, modular “microclinics” equipped with portable medical devices and AI-powered software to enable remote diagnosis and treatment. He has now established a Hanover-based nonprofit for the venture and is currently working to raise capital for wide deployment of the portable clinics.
Davis named the venture Mary Global Health.
He found support from the start at Dartmouth. First, becoming a Global Health Fellow at the Dickey Center allowed him to lay the groundwork for his vision. Through his medical school connections, and Dickey’s many long-standing contacts and resources in Ghana, Davis was able to map out a feasibility study for his microclinics.
Then, armed with the development plan he fleshed out as a Global Health Fellow, Davis was able to apply for and win a $3,000 Founders Grant from the Magnuson Center that allowed him to deploy a portable clinic in Ghana to gather data from actual patients in the field. He is now using this continuing study to seek venture capital funding with the aim of deploying scores of microclinics to remote parts of Ghana. He is also one of two students named this summer as the Dickey Center’s Dianna L. Rynkiewicz 1984 Global Health Interns, created by her classmates to honor the life of Rynkiewicz ’84, an infectious disease physician who died in 2010.
So far, the Mary Global Health project has done health screenings for more than 80 patients through a mobile clinic in the Accra region, followed by a continuing study using the software to do basic health screening of some 300 patients with Dr. Faith Asasenkasa at SDAl Hospital in Kwadaso, a remote area of Ghana.
One of the primary objectives of the work is to test the software that allows nurses to run an intake questionnaire with patients that can be reviewed by doctors from remote locations. Another goal was to determine the baseline of medical equipment, such rapid blood testing kits and ultrasound machines, required when the microclinics are deployed.
“What these microclinics are going to be able to do, even in urban areas where people face long waits at public hospitals, is provide access to primary care for a large part of the population who don’t have that now,” says Kwame Owusu Ansah, program manager for social entrepreneurship at the Magnuson Center. Owusu Ansah, who is also from Ghana, first came to Dartmouth in 2022 with the State Department’s Young African Leadership Initiative, hosted by the Dickey Center.
“It’s going to reduce the unwarranted deaths that are caused by lack of access to health professionals and clinics.”
Dawn Carey, senior associate director of global health and development at the DIckey Center, says that beyond the direct support offered by centers like Dickey and Magnuson, there is the broad network of resources including laboratories, trailblazing faculty, engaged alumni, and professional networks that the centers help open up for students.
“Honestly, this is the magic of Dartmouth. It’s giving students access to opportunities using tools that are developed in the classroom, and by tapping into the broad and trusted networks we have developed over time, and helping them go beyond the classroom to make a real impact,” Carey says.
Davis’ project illustrates how this works in the real world. The panels for the portable clinics were designed and built in Thayer School of Engineering’s machine shop. Davis was able to get advice on developing medical resources from Associate Professor of Health Policy and Clinical Practice Inas Khayal, head of the Sustainable Health Lab at Geisel School of Medicine. He is continuing to work with Professor of Biomedical Data Science and Epidemiology Saeed Hassanpour, director of the Center for Precision Health and Artificial Intelligence, to develop interactive artificial intelligence to assist with patient intake and diagnosis, and he is currently in talks with a venture capital firm with support from the Magnuson Center.
The work of creating new knowledge is reciprocal. For example, Davis’ collaboration with Hassanpour is also helping to expand the CPHAI’s AI data set to include input from under-accessed communities.
“Because any AI product is only as good as the diversity of data on which it is trained, we want to bring the most underprivileged and under-resourced people into the conversation right from the onset,” Davis says.
In a letter of support for Mary Global Health, formerly MaryAI, to potential investors, Hassanpour writes, “We are happy to work closely with MaryAI’s team and support MaryAI’s efforts to not only advance the field of precision health but also to contribute significantly to reducing health care disparities by making diagnostics more accessible and accurate.”
The bottom line, says the Magnuson Center’s Owusu Ansah, is that Mary Global Health “is really going to be a life changer. It’s going to save a lot of lives.”