Medical devices are indispensable in health care delivery as tools for prevention, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation. However, despite the exponential growth of scientific and technological development, availability of and access to appropriate and affordable health technologies in low- and middle-income countries are still insufficient. The Medical Devices unit of WHO aims to help make available the benefits of core health technologies with the purpose to address global health concerns by developing a framework for health technology management, assessment and regulation and by challenging the scientific and business community to identify and develop innovative technologies. This call for innovative health technologies aims at identifying innovative health technologies which address global health concerns and which are likely to be appropriate and affordable for use in low-resource settings. Selected innovative technologies will be published in the "Compendium of innovative health technologies for low-resource settings 2012" on the Medical Devices website of WHO and will be available to all interested stakeholders. http://www.who.int/medical_devices/innovation/mde_2ndcall/en/index.html