Digital Financial Services for Health: Programmatic Case Studies from Kenya and Rwanda

Digital financial services (DFS) for health have been identified as a category of innovations that can contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 3.8 of achieving universal health coverage (UHC). Applications include digital health insurance; health savings accounts; credit, transfers, remittances, and loans for health purposes; vouchers for health care; payments for health care/insurance by beneficiaries; and bulk purchases/payments across the health system, including payments to health workers.

This research is intended to examine, through two programmatic case studies, the role of DFS in advancing financial protection in accessing health services and supporting improved health system performance in two countries, Rwanda and Kenya.

The case studies are:

● Community‐based health insurance (CBHI) program in Rwanda

● M-TIBA-based i-PUSH program and Medical Credit Fund (MCF) loans including Cash Advance (CA) and Mobile Asset Financing (MAF) in Kenya