Mobile-based Vaccine Registry to Improve Collection and Completeness of Maternal Immunization Data

This research article was published by International Journal of Advanced Computer Science and Applications Vol. 13, No. 3, 2022Immunization during pregnancy and infancy significantly reduces morbidity and mortality of mothers, unborn fetuses, and young infants. Several studies show the merits of getting complete, quality, and accurate data on time to enhance policy and decision-making for society or country development. Despite the efforts by nations to ensure the success of maternal immunization through electronic immunization registries, limited resources such as poor internet access, shortage of electricity, and digital illiteracy in developing countries hinder the goal of full immunization of mothers and infants. Since 2015, immunization programs in Tanzania use internet-based information systems to collect immunization data from health facilities and submit them to the responsible authority for further decision-making such as the allocation of vaccines to health facilities. The internet-based media is not fully achieved in developing countries due to its cost and resource setting, thus, the responsible authority does not receive instant data to update its vaccine inventory and management activities which often results in partial immunization due to the unavailability of vaccines in some facilities. This challenge can be solved by having an affordable system that instantly incorporates and transmits vaccination details such as the utilization of vaccines and demands from each health facility to responsible authority with less resources. The present study proposes a USSD platform to enhance the receipt of real-time data by immunization authorities from both health facilities with poor and good internet connectivity at a lesser cost. A greater number of health facilities in Tanzania prefer to use both online and offline platforms for collecting and recording immunization data. As electronic immunization registry has been introduced in areas with limited resources, it is recommended the use online and offline platforms for data collection so that they can submit immunization data in real-time without the delays caused by poor resource setting

USSD technology a low cost asset in complementing public health workers' work processes: paper presented at: BioInformatics and Bio Engineering Conference, Granada, Spain

Conference: BioInformatics and Bio Engineering Conference, At Granada, SpainLowering costs and easy access to health information is important to public healthcare workers (PHWs) and patients who are both offline and online to improve equitable access to healthcare information. Harnessing mobile health (mHealth) improves the quality of and access to healthcare services in low income countries in which residents are remotely dispersed and have limitations in accessing the internet. Unstructured Supplementary Service Data(USSD) technology has been used to perform mobile money transactions through Ecocash, Telecash and Onewallet services but there is little use of the technology for clinical data repositories (CDRs). USSD codes facility is a cross-platform mobile handset support solution which allows the health services providers and patients to interact almost anywhere and at anytime. MHealth implementation through platforms such as EconetHealth merely focuses on health tips and there is need for emphasis on linking CDRs with USSD technology

An ICT strategy for sustainable tourism in Zimbabwe

This research sought to develop an ICT strategy for sustainable tourism in Zimbabwe. The Government of Zimbabwe has identified ICT and tourism both as strategic industries and pillars for economic revival. The tourism sector was identified as an essential source of foreign exchange earnings and as a means to drive the economy to greater heights and reduce poverty through direct employment in down-stream and up-stream industries. Despite being endowed with rich natural resources that include five World Natural Heritage sites, exquisite flora and fauna. Zimbabwe is not performing well in the world tourism sector. The Southern African country continues to be ranked low on World Economic Forum Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index. Despite the country‘s strengths, in terms of endowments, the low Tourism and Travel Competitiveness Index suggests weaknesses in related areas. There is currently no clear strategy for the sustainable use of ICT in the tourism sector in Zimbabwe. Despite huge investments and advances in ICT, services in the tourism sector in Zimbabwe continue to be delivered manually and in traditional ways. Therefore, this research sought to propose a strategy for the sustainable use of ICT in the tourism sector in Zimbabwe. However, this strategy had to be informed and supported by an empirical study of the shortcomings in the existing situation in the tourism sector. In order to achieve this objective, this research, which is a comprehensive case study on the tourism sector in Zimbabwe, deployed semi-structured interviews, questionnaires, observations and netnography to collect data. The case study was carried out in accordance with the steps for conducting a case as outlined by Yin guided by an interpretive paradigm. The entities and organisations that formed part of the case study were purposefully chosen to provide a representative sample of the tourism role-players in Zimbabwe. The samples were based on sample variation and feasibility (taking into consideration factors such as geographical location, organisational thrust and size). Data collection involved semi-structured interviews with various role-players in the tourism sector. The role-players interviewed included officials from the government, the regulator and from the service providers. The interviews were held in Harare, Bulawayo, Gweru, Chinhoyi, Matopos, Hwange and Victoria Falls. A Zimbabwe annual premier tourism expo, Sanganai/Hlanganani World Travel and Tourism Africa Fair, was also attended in order to interact with various players and to conduct formal and informal interviews. The questionnaires, which were completed by tourists, were administered in Harare, Hwange, Victoria Falls, Matopos, and the Beitbridge and Kazungula border posts. An online version of the questionnaire was also administered. The questionnaire link was e-mailed to tourists, as some of them did not have enough time to complete them during their stay in Zimbabwe and agreed to do so via email. The data was analysed in two phases - structured coding and thematic analysis. . Key factors were identified through structural coding and thematic analysis. Country-specific, sector-specific and organisationalspecific factors were identified for tourists, the government, the regulator and service providers. After a further analysis of the results, those that pointed to the same factors were grouped together and a deduction was made as a diagnosis of the problem was identified. The identified problems were synthesised into seven diagnostics: (i) lack of infrastructure and enabling services; (ii) e-customer relationship management; (iii) lack of collaboration and poor systems integration, (iv) policy and regulation; (v) lack of financial resources; (vi) poor ICT governance and (vii) poor human resource development. A guiding policy was then identified for each of the diagnostics, leading to a set of coherent actions. The research also showed the implementation of this set of actions that consisting of three layers, namely, government, regulator and service providers. This research contributes to the existing body of knowledge by providing a clear strategy formulation model and showing how the implementation will be rolled out. The ICT-related challenges were diagnosed, guiding policies formulated to address the situation and required coherent actions suggested. This research is deemed to be significant for understanding the future of ICT use in developing countries like Zimbabwe