More than 2 700 residents were screened in Mafefe, a Limpopo community affected by the legacy of asbestos mining. Healthcare Framework (HCF) managed the patient journey, Nexus AI CXR assisted first-pass chest X-ray assessment, and CloudX is supporting radiologist reporting.
Why Mafefe needed a connected response
Mafefe has lived with the consequences of historic asbestos mining for decades. The community and public authorities have raised concerns about contaminated sites and the long-term health of residents. TB, silicosis, asbestosis and other occupational lung diseases share a screening pathway and disproportionately affect people who worked in or lived beside extractive industry. A screening effort here needed to do more than acquire chest images, it had to identify people, capture their history, process studies at scale, obtain specialist reads and keep the result connected to follow-up.
How the programme worked
- The field team registered each participant in HCF, creating a clinical record for the screening encounter, and HCF managed the assessment and programme workflow, including wellness, HIV and lung health screening.
- Ultra-portable X-ray units were used, allowing digital chest X-rays to be taken in remote settings where even electricity is not available, with a single health worker able to carry the machine into the community.
- Studies were inferenced by Nexus AI, indicating any findings that are not consistent with a normal lung field, including findings suggestive of tuberculosis (TB), on site and without an internet connection, and the AI output remained linked to the patient record.
- CloudX, via HCF’s automated image allocation algorithm, allowed radiologists to remotely report on the chest X-ray cases that required clinical confirmation, in partnership with MBOD and Wits University.
- Clinical teams use HCF to manage patient care, track laboratory results and radiologist reports, and generate referral letters, ensuring patients are referred to the appropriate hospital and treatment is initiated where required.
- MBOD Benefit Medical Evaluations (BME) for former mineworkers run in parallel, supporting access to the occupational disease compensation process, and patient and screening data between HCF and the MBOD system were integrated for this Mafefe project, ensuring unified reporting and client medical records.
What the deployment demonstrated
With more than 2 700 residents screened, the programme demonstrated that integrated clinical services combining digital health systems, AI-assisted chest X-ray screening, remote radiology reporting, case management and referrals can be delivered effectively in rural and remote communities with limited resources.
Projects like these support quality clinical care, early disease detection, access to compensation for eligible former mine workers, and improved referral and treatment initiation. The programme provides a valuable model for comprehensive lung health screening in both the wider community and former mine-working communities.
For health authorities, the value is continuity. A study requiring further investigation is associated with a known person and a managed clinical action, rather than a disconnected image or emailed report. The same configuration can be adapted for other mining-affected communities and occupational lung health programmes, where Nexus AI’s occupational lung disease models (silicosis and other pneumoconioses, currently in Beta) are progressing through external evaluation with the Stop TB Partnership.
