Aafiya Med (Pty) Ltd is a Cape Town-based health-technology company developing AI-powered platforms for patients, physicians, and the national health system.
⚠️ Clinical Validation Phase: Aafiya platforms are undergoing clinical testing. SAHPRA submission planned Q3 2026. Not yet approved for commercial use.
Each product addresses a distinct layer of South Africa's broken healthcare value chain — together forming a vertically integrated AI health ecosystem that spans primary care, clinical support, diagnostics, and family wellbeing.
South Africa's first AI primary care platform with mandatory HPCSA physician sign-off. Patients access clinically validated consultations via USSD or PWA — free at point of care, in all 11 official languages.
An Android application giving HPCSA-licensed physicians AI-assisted differential diagnosis support. Powered by Aafiya AI, it combines text queries, voice intake, real-time consultation listening, and multimodal image analysis.
A purpose-built Laboratory Information System for South African pathology labs. PathLab LIS modernises specimen tracking, result management, and reporting workflows — integrated with Aafiya's clinical platforms for closed-loop diagnostics.
South Africa's free platform helping families of neurodivergent children find therapy, navigate SASSA grants, understand school rights, and connect with community — in all 11 official languages, with WhatsApp access requiring no data.
From symptom entry to lab result — and from diagnosis to family support — every touchpoint in the care continuum is connected, enabling closed-loop diagnostics and physician-supervised AI care at scale.
We're building in public. Here's what we've shipped, what we're validating, and what's coming next on the path to NHI integration.
Aafiya Med (Pty) Ltd incorporated as a Level 1 B-BBEE contributor. 100% black-owned, 67% black-woman-owned structure established. Initial equity structure confirmed, founding team in place.
All three portfolio products built and deployed: Aafiya patient platform (USSD + PWA), SecondOpinion physician app (Android), and PathLab LIS (web). FHIR R4 interoperability layer implemented. Aafiya AI models integrated with physician review workflow.
SAHPRA regulatory dossier drafted for Aafiya as Class IIb medical device (AI-assisted clinical decision support). Clinical safety protocols, physician oversight framework, and adverse event reporting systems documented in line with SAHPRA guidance.
Structured clinical validation with HPCSA-registered physicians at a pilot clinic. Testing diagnostic accuracy, physician override rates, patient satisfaction, and time-to-treatment across 500+ consultations. Data will inform SAHPRA submission and NHI pilot proposal.
Formal submission of Aafiya to SAHPRA for Class IIb medical device approval. Includes clinical validation results, technical documentation, risk management file, and post-market surveillance plan. 6–9 month review cycle expected.
Partnership discussions with NHI Fund, provincial health departments, and district health councils to pilot Aafiya in underserved communities. Target: 10,000 patient consultations across 3 pilot districts. Full FHIR interoperability with NHI data exchange architecture.
Aafiya Med (Pty) Ltd is a 100% black-owned, 67% black-woman-owned enterprise — a Level One B-BBEE contributor carrying 135% procurement recognition. Built to serve the communities most affected by South Africa's healthcare crisis.
In a physician-supervised AI health platform, credibility starts with the physicians. Our clinical advisors bring deep expertise in South African primary care, regulatory compliance, and AI safety.
Medical doctor with expertise in AI-assisted clinical decision support and South African healthcare system architecture. Focused on physician-supervised AI models, HPCSA compliance frameworks, and NHI interoperability standards.
We are building a clinical advisory board of HPCSA-registered physicians with experience in underserved community health, AI safety evaluation, and district health system implementation. Interested clinicians can reach out to hello@aafiya.app.
All clinical decisions on the Aafiya platform are reviewed and approved by HPCSA-registered medical practitioners. AI serves as a clinical decision support tool — never as a replacement for physician judgment.
Our technical architecture is designed for the realities of South African healthcare: intermittent connectivity, diverse devices, and the need for seamless data exchange with NHI systems.
Aafiya Med was founded on a single conviction: that South Africa's healthcare crisis is not a resource problem — it is a distribution and access problem that AI can help solve.
We build at the intersection of clinical rigour and emerging technology — always with physicians in the loop, always with the 50 million underserved South Africans in mind. Our four platforms address patient access, physician decision support, laboratory integration, and family support for neurodivergent children — one unified ecosystem designed for the NHI era.
For partnerships, investor relations, or press enquiries: hello@aafiya.app
"A South Africa where every person, regardless of income or geography, can access physician-reviewed clinical care within hours — through any phone, in their own language, at no cost to them."
South Africa has lost 12,745 doctors and 58,897 nurses from the public sector since 2013. 80% of doctors serve only 15% of the population. 50 million people have no digital primary care alternative. AI exists to close this gap — if built responsibly, with physicians in the loop.
The questions we hear most from medical aids, pharmacy groups, physicians, and regulators.
The HPCSA-registered physician who reviews and signs off on every consultation holds clinical liability — not the AI, and not Aafiya Med as the platform provider. AI serves as a clinical decision support tool under physician supervision. This mirrors the liability framework for other decision-support technologies (e.g., radiology AI, lab analysers). Physicians retain full authority to accept, modify, or reject AI recommendations.
All patient data is encrypted in transit and at rest. Patients provide explicit consent before any data is collected. Data is pseudonymised where possible, and access is restricted to authorised clinical users only. We maintain a POPIA-compliant data processing register, conduct regular privacy impact assessments, and have appointed a designated Information Officer. Patients can request data deletion at any time via hello@aafiya.app.
Physician judgment always takes precedence. Every AI recommendation can be accepted, modified, or rejected by the reviewing doctor. All overrides are logged (with reason codes) and feed back into model training to improve future accuracy. In early pilots, we expect ~10-15% override rates as the AI learns South African clinical patterns — this is by design. The system is built to defer to clinical expertise, not replace it.
Not yet. We are currently in the clinical validation phase, with a SAHPRA Class IIb medical device submission planned for Q3 2026. The platform is operational for pilot testing with consenting patients under physician supervision. Full commercial deployment will follow SAHPRA approval, expected in late 2026 or early 2027.
We use FHIR R4 for all data exchange, which is compatible with most modern claims and authorisation systems. We can integrate via HL7 FHIR APIs or through existing switch providers (e.g., Healthbridge, Medigram). For medical aids, we offer eligibility checking, real-time authorisation requests, and claims submission — all via standardised FHIR messaging. We're open to partnership discussions with any scheme interested in expanding primary care access for their members.
Yes, partially. The USSD channel works over basic cellular (no data required). The SecondOpinion physician app has an on-device AI fallback (Gemma 3n) for clinical queries when offline. Full consultation workflows require connectivity for physician review and e-prescription submission, but intake and triage can happen offline and sync later.
We are building strategic partnerships across medical aid schemes, pharmacy groups, laboratory networks, and the NHI implementation ecosystem.
care.aafiya.app — Patient Platform
secondopinion.aafiya.app — Physician App
pathlab.aafiya.app — Pathology Management
neuroconnect.space — Family Support
For press enquiries or partnership announcements, contact hello@aafiya.app
We're looking for mission-driven engineers, clinicians, and operators who want to solve South Africa's healthcare access crisis. Early team, high impact, equity upside.
careers@aafiya.app →