Understanding and valuing the broader health system benefits of Uganda’s national Human Resources for Health Information System investment

Background\ud To address the need for timely and comprehensive human resources for health (HRH) information, governments and organizations have been actively investing in electronic health information interventions, including in low-resource settings. The economics of human resources information systems (HRISs) in low-resource settings are not well understood, however, and warrant investigation and validation.\ud \ud Case description\ud This case study describes Uganda’s Human Resources for Health Information System (HRHIS), implemented with support from the US Agency for International Development, and documents perceptions of its impact on the health labour market against the backdrop of the costs of implementation. Through interviews with end users and implementers in six different settings, we document pre-implementation data challenges and consider how the HRHIS has been perceived to affect human resources decision-making and the healthcare employment environment.\ud \ud Discussion and evaluation\ud This multisite case study documented a range of perceived benefits of Uganda’s HRHIS through interviews with end users that sought to capture the baseline (or pre-implementation) state of affairs, the perceived impact of the HRHIS and the monetary value associated with each benefit. In general, the system appears to be strengthening both demand for health workers (through improved awareness of staffing patterns) and supply (by improving licensing, recruitment and competency of the health workforce). This heightened ability to identify high-value employees makes the health sector more competitive for high-quality workers, and this elevation of the health workforce also has broader implications for health system performance and population health.\ud \ud Conclusions\ud Overall, it is clear that HRHIS end users in Uganda perceived the system to have significantly improved day-to-day operations as well as longer term institutional mandates. A more efficient and responsive approach to HRH allows the health sector to recruit the best candidates, train employees in needed skills and deploy trained personnel to facilities where there is real demand. This cascade of benefits can extend the impact and rewards of working in the health sector, which elevates the health system as a whole

An informatics agenda for public health: summarized recommendations from the 2011 AMIA PHI Conference

The AMIA Public Health Informatics 2011 Conference brought together members of the public health and health informatics communities to revisit the national agenda developed at the AMIA Spring Congress in 2001, assess the progress that has been made in the past decade, and develop recommendations to further guide the field. Participants met in five discussion tracks: technical framework; research and evaluation; ethics; education, professional training, and workforce development; and sustainability. Participants identified 62 recommendations, which clustered into three key themes related to the need to (1) enhance communication and information sharing within the public health informatics community, (2) improve the consistency of public health informatics through common public health terminologies, rigorous evaluation methodologies, and competency-based training, and (3) promote effective coordination and leadership that will champion and drive the field forward. The agenda and recommendations from the meeting will be disseminated and discussed throughout the public health and informatics communities. Both communities stand to gain much by working together to use these recommendations to further advance the application of information technology to improve health

National Collaborative for Bio-Preparedness

OBJECTIVE: Demonstrate the functionality of the National Collaborative for Bio-Preparedness system. INTRODUCTION: The National Collaborative for Bio-Preparedness (NCB-Prepared) was established in 2010 to create a biosurveillance resource to enhance situational awareness and emergency preparedness. This joint-institutional effort has drawn on expertise from the University of North Carolina- Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University, and SAS Institute, leveraging North Carolina’s role as a leader in syndromic surveillance, technology development and health data standards. As an unprecedented public/private alliance, they bring the flexibility of the private sector to support the public sector. The project has developed a functioning prototype system for multiple states that will be scaled and made more robust for national adoption. METHODS: NCB-Prepared recognizes that the capability of any biosurveillance system is a function of the data is analyzes. NCB-Prepared is designed to provide information services that analyze and integrate national data across a variety of domains, such as human clinical, veterinary and physical data. In addition to this one-health approach to surveillance, a primary objective of NCB-Prepared is to gather data that is closer in time to the event of interest. NCB-Prepared has validated the usefulness of North Carolina emergency medical services data for the purposes of biosurveillance of both acute outbreaks and seasonal epidemics (1). A unique model of user-driven valuing of data-providing value back to the provider in their terms-motivates collaboration from potential data providers, along with timely and complete data. NCB-Prepared approaches potential data providers, partners and users with the proposition that enhanced data quality and analysis is valuable to them individually and that an integrated information system can be valuable to all. With the onboarding of new data sources, NCB-Prepared implements a formal process of data discovery and integration. The goal of this process is three-fold: 1) to develop recommendations to enhance data quality going forward, 2) to integrate information across data sources, and 3) to develop novel analytic techniques for detecting health threats. NCB-Prepared is committed to both utilizing standard methods for event detection and to developing innovative analytics for biosurveillance such as the Text Analytics and Proportional charts method (TAP). The sophisticated analytic functionality of the system, including improved time to detection, query reporting, alert detection, forecasting and predictive modeling, can be attributed to collaboration between analysts from private industry, academia and public health. NCB-Prepared followed the formal software development process known as agile development to create the user interface of the system. This method is based on iterative cycles wherein requirements evolve from regular sessions between user groups and developers. The result of agile development and collaborative relationships is a system which visualizes signals and diverse data sources across time and place while providing information services across all levels of users and stakeholders. CONCLUSIONS: 1. Understand the functionality of new biosurveillance system, NCB-Prepared. 2. Identify the benefit of creating collaborative relationships with data providers and users. 3. Appreciate the value of a public/private partnership for biosurveillance and bio-preparedness

National Collaborative for Bio-Preparedness

The National Collaborative for Bio-Preparedness (NCB-Prepared) is a public-private partnership to develop, test and implement an advanced biosurveillance system. It is a collaborative effort of academic, government and industry leaders focused on developing a local, bottom-up approach to situational awareness and emergency preparedness