The Haute Autorité de Santé, on November 19, 2021, declared that 10% of Covid-19 patients develop long covid, a syndrome recognized by the WHO in 2020. In November 2021, the University Hospitals of Geneva (HUG) put online RAFAEL, an interactive platform that allows them to get information and to know, if necessary, which health professionals to turn to. Partnerships with several hospitals, international organizations, associations, networks and institutions in French-speaking Switzerland and Quebec have recently been set up in order to reach and inform a larger number of French-speaking Internet users. Established in 1995, the HUG includes the eight public hospitals of Geneva and, since July 1, 2016, two clinics (Joli-Mont and Crans-Montana). Research and training are an integral part of their mission and are carried out in close collaboration with the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Geneva (UNIGE). They have also created together the Hug Foundation which financed the Rafael platform.

The new partners of the HUG

RAFAEL is a website with a chatbot, intended for the general public and health professionals, whose ambition was, from its launch, to expand to new French-speaking audiences. RAFAEL now includes the following partners:
  • The University Hospital of Vaud (CHUV)
  • Unisanté
  • The Riviera-Chablais Hospital, Vaud-Valais (HRC)
  • The Jura Hospital
  • The Valais Hospital
  • The High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR)
  • The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
  • Partners from the University of Sherbrooke, Canada
  • The Réseau mediX romandie
  • The Delta Network
  • The Long Covid Switzerland association
  • The Swiss Society of General Internal Medicine

Enriching the chatbot through these partnerships

RAFAEL is equipped with a chatbot to answer the most frequent questions asked by Internet users 24/7. When no answer is found, health professionals contact the person to answer within 48 hours. The chatbot will therefore be enriched with answers provided by health specialists by receiving new questions and will become increasingly relevant. Establishing these partnerships will allow it to do so much faster. Dr. Mayssam Nehme, clinical head of the Department of Primary Care Medicine at the HUG, explains:
"Exchanges and sharing of experiences between the public and health specialists allow for understanding, learning and enrichment about post-Covid symptoms. Expanding the RAFAEL platform therefore increases the scope of knowledge and provides better information about post-Covid symptoms and their evolution."

Increasing the audience by targeting regions

Medical teams at each of the partners will now encourage patients who come to them with post-Covid symptoms to request RAFAEL. Their staff will also help tailor the information content and ensure referrals to existing local and regional consultations. Prof. Idris Guessous, M.D., Head of the Department of Primary Care Medicine at HUG, Associate Professor at the University of Geneva (UNIGE), states:
"After six months of activity, we are delighted to be able to expand our platform to new partners and territories. As RAFAEL is the first French-speaking academic platform for exchange and information on post-Covid symptoms, we receive many messages from various sources, as this is a syndrome that affects millions of people in very different ways. We are dealing with a new chronic disease that will continue to infect populations for years to come. So we will continue to offer RAFAEL to other institutions."
New partners will be integrated into the RAFAEL platform in the future. Translated from RAFAEL vise à devenir la plateforme dédiée au post-Covid de référence en francophonie

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