gms | German Medical Science

Background: Universal Health Coverage (UHC) is a global priority and essential for providing quality healthcare without financial hardship. Health financing plays a crucial role by raising revenues, enabling risk-sharing through pooling of funds, and allocating resources. The emergence of digital technologies for health financing (DTHF) presents opportunities to strengthen healthcare systems, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, only limited information exists on DTHF in LMICs.

Objective: We aim to provide a comprehensive overview of DTHF in LMICs by identifying and describing existing DTHF, exploring evaluation approaches, examining their positive and negative effects, and investigating facilitating factors and barriers for implementation at the national level.

Methods: Our scoping review follows the methodological framework proposed by Arksey and O'Malley [1], further developed by Levac et al. [2] and the Joanna Briggs Institute [3]. The eligibility criteria for studies reflect the three core elements of the search strategy:

1.

health financing,

2.

digital technologies and

3.

and middle-income countries.

We search in multiple databases, including Medline via PubMed, EMBASE via Ovid, the Web of Science Core Collection, CENTRAL via Cochrane, and the Global Index Medicus by the World Health Organization. We include all documents published in English, French, German or Spanish published between the 1st of January 2000 and the 20th of September 2023. The extracted information is synthesised from both quantitative and qualitative studies.

Results: The search strategy yielded approximately 61,000 records. During the screening process, we initially identified only a few relevant documents published in peer-reviewed journals. However, through the search of grey literature, we uncovered additional relevant documents and reports. Preliminary examination of the results indicates that there is limited data available on the evaluation of implemented DTHF.

Implication for research and/or (healthcare) practice: By following a rigorous methodological framework and employing a comprehensive search strategy across various databases, we extracted valuable insights into DTFH in LMICs. This can facilitate the adoption and adaptation of DTHF across LMICs, thereby contributing to progressing towards UHC.

Funding: Individual funding (BMG, DRV, BMBF, DFG, etc); Project name: Research to Improve Resilience in Major African Cities through Universal Health Coverage; Grant number: 01DG21016A