dhis2-users team mailing list archive

[Knut Staring <knutst@xxxxxxxxx>]

Nice use case.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: ICTworks <ict-works@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, Jan 24, 2018 at 11:06 AM
Subject: The Best Mobile Data Collection Systems Support the Oldest Data
Collection Process
To: knutst@xxxxxxxxx


The Best Mobile Data Collection Systems Support the Oldest Data Collection
Process
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=085796288d&e=b9411d1d07>
*By
Guest Writer on January 24, 2018*

[image: Watch the Video] <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deemu0mzyhk>

Tara is a frontline health worker
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=ad348f31d3&e=b9411d1d07>
who sits in a small, but meticulously clean clinic at the southernmost
point of one of Vanuatu’s more remote islands. The levers of every window
are open, blowing a lazy tropical breeze into the consultation room along
with the occasional moth and stray leaf.

It’s a little dim in here – Tara’s solar panels stopped working a few
months ago – and she tells us that more than once in recent weeks she has
had to deliver a baby using only the beam of her head torch.

She is not using complex technology, just fierce resourcefulness. And, it’s
pretty remarkable.

It’s also a telling contrast to the complex technology we’ve built to
support her work. Sitting in front of her, recording her responses is our
Tupaia MediTrak app, where we are providing her a link with top health
decision makers in the country and the region to help, for one thing, get
the solar up and running so she can continue to provide healthcare to more
than 6,000 people in the surrounding villages.
Tupaia Health Resource and Supply Chain Mapping

We’ve spent the last 10 months meticulously designing the technology that
needs to support Tupaia.org
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=d6cb165fac&e=b9411d1d07>,
a project that aims to map health facilities in 7 participating countries
in the Asia Pacific region.

   - Tupaia MediTrak
   <https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=42d26a3d8c&e=b9411d1d07>,
   our free to download and use app built in React Native that syncs to a
   mySQL database
   - mSupply Mobile
   <https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=f64ac3a941&e=b9411d1d07>,
   an open source stock management app built in React Native that synchronises
   its data to Tupaia. mSupply desktop is built on a 4D platform.
   - Tupaia.org
   <https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=bf01136fff&e=b9411d1d07>
   is a React front-end showing the data from all sources that is aggregated
   on a DHIS2 instance and then configured in NodeJS.

The project is named after the legendary Polynesian navigator who joined Lt
James Cook on his voyages through the Pacific. He was known for his
incredible skill, directing the explorers from island to island by reading
the winds, waves and the stars. Tupaia is funded by the Australian
Government’s innovationXchange program
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=5ba56d6952&e=b9411d1d07>

Our mapping is certainly more dependent on technology than in Tupaia’s
time. Data is aggregated in real time from a number of sources, including
Hospital Information Systems, electronic Logistics Management Information
Systems (eLMIS) and Mobile eLMIS, whilst the Tupaia MediTrak app collects
answers to a myriad of questions about medicines availability,
infrastructure, equipment, finances, services and disaster preparedness.
This app syncs whenever it detects an internet connection, sending the data
to our online interactive map at Tupaia.org.
How Governments and Health Workers Use Tupaia

This map allows governments to get a birds-eye view of the health of their
healthcare system, so to speak. They can see, for example, which clinics
have functioning refrigerators to store vaccines, where medicine is
overstocked or undersupplied, and they can also track the treatment of
common conditions such as childhood diarrhoea.

Importantly, they use the app to direct their often limited resources to
where they are needed most. If you visit Tupaia today, you can already see
data for around 900 facilities in Solomon Islands, Kiribati, PNG, Tonga,
Timor-Leste, Tokelau and, of course, Vanuatu.

You and the general public can access a basic level of information about
facility locations and the services they provide (more than enough to make
a data nerd froth at the mouth), and Governments control the access to more
detailed information such as medicines availability.

Typically, each country allows crucial staff like Tara and other frontline
health workers to see additional information, such as medicines
availability in nearby facilities, equipment availability or how their
clinic is performing compared with others in their area. Health workers
can, for example, report when their fridge has stopped working and this can
be seen immediately by Cold Chain managers.
Humans Still Trump Technology

Despite the technology, our most valuable data still comes from face to
face interactions, like those with Tara. Our Tupaia teams work with
local Ministry
of Health
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=817df6970f&e=b9411d1d07>
pharmacists to physically visit every clinic or hospital around the country.

We sit with nurses and doctors, talk about issues in the ordering and
delivery of medicine, building maintenance or difficulties accessing
further training when you might need to take two boats and a truck to get
to the nearest airport.

*Technology is paramount but it only supports the oldest data collection
method in history.*

And that is our biggest lesson from this project so far. You can put in
place the most advanced, user-friendly tech in the world, but you can’t
properly capture these challenges by looking at a spreadsheet, running an
email survey or chatting with Ministry officials.

In the Pacific, the concept of storying is paramount – to show respect to a
person and their ideas, you must be willing to sit, talk and make the
effort to hear what they have to say in their own time. And it is this
practice that has shown the staff in these remote clinics that we’re
serious. We know that the strength of a system comes from supporting every
cog, from the clinic, to the regional hospitals right up to the health
minister themselves.

We hope that by combining the old with the new, we are doing Tupaia proud
and our bit to create stronger, more resilient healthcare systems in the
Asia Pacific region.

*By Irene Scott
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=61a69dcf5b&e=b9411d1d07>,
Director of Communications at Tupaia.org*

The post The Best Mobile Data Collection Systems Support the Oldest Data
Collection Process
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=adc30e5c97&e=b9411d1d07>
appeared first on ICTworks
<https://ictworks.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=84e9f392a668e74df589375c7&id=b1f3159f63&e=b9411d1d07>
.
What Do Others Think? Check out the Comments
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-- 
Knut Staring

Department of Information, Evidence and Research
World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland
Office: +41 22 791 3683 Mob1: +33 6 4434 2931 Mob2: +47 9188 0522
Skype:     knutstar