The College Research and Innovation Hub (CRIH) organised an Innovation workshop in Collaboration with The Innovation and Design-thinking Academy (TIDA). The Workshop themed “From Design to Delivery: Building Patient-Centred Solutions for Nigeria’s Healthcare” held at the Paul Hendrickse Lecture Theatre, University College Hospital, on the 28th of June, 2025.
In his welcome address, the CRIH President stressed that the workshop was in line with CRIH’s vision of “producing world-class graduates, efficient in medical research and innovation”. Also in attendance was Prof. Rufus Akinyemi—Professor of Neurology and Grand Patron of the Hub. Quoting Albert Einstein, he said, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”. He encouraged participants to leverage curiosity and co-creation to design innovative solutions that would have lasting impact.
The facilitators of the workshop, Dr Abdulhammed Babatunde and Pharmacists Yusuf Babatunde and Nezianya Onyinye Jacintha took turns to explain the process of design thinking with emphasis on healthcare problems. Thereafter, participants were split into groups to design an adolescent-friendly health clinic.
The workshop ended with each group giving a rapid presentation of their idea, with Group 6 emerging with the best intervention. Speaking with UIMSA Press, Uchechi, a member of the winning group said, “It was my first time attending an event like that, and the hands-on session really stood out to me. We were able to visualize their ideas in real time and that was super cool. Fortunately, we had a lot of similar ideas in my group, so it was really easy to create a final project. We were able to tie in our innovation with research and the judges appreciated that”.
