IMPROVING THE HEALTH INFORMATION SYSTEM (HIS) OF GHANA
As expected, she was upset about the inefficiency of the health information system. She felt the ministry of health (MOH) was doing little to disseminate health information especially when health personnel had little or no information on the Ebola virus. But can one blame the HIS of Ghana considering its challenges and the fact that little is being done to rectify its challenges (See Analysis of the state of the nation address below)? The challenges of the HIS may not be the only reason for the weak dissemination of the of Ebola health alert to the public and especially the health workforce. I believe one reason is our approach to communicate health information, like this Ebola alert to Ghana's entire population.
Too often we are tempted to sew a one size dress and try to fit it to customers of varying sizes probably to save time and cut cost etc.. In the end, we fail to realize these benefits because not everyone could wear this one size dress. In the case of the Ebola alert, it looks like the MOH may have used social media to disseminate this alert when close to 80% of Ghana's 25 million population is not active on the internet and social media.It may also have used the electronic and print media to disseminate this alert when these weren't the preferred medium of communication among its target audience. Also MOH may not be making use of mobile phone penetration (about 26 million mobile phone users) in the country to send out an SMS alert to Ghana's population. In the end this health alert was not well communicated.There is therefore the need to use the right medium for the right audience as;
- it ensures that a message is received and used by the target audience
- money is saved as one does not spend on the wrong media
- it prevents delays and saves time and
- resource including human resource is effectively and efficiently distributed to avoid losses.
Olime Health therefore believes that moving forward, a thorough research exercise should be conducted by the MOH/GHS into the most effective way to communicate health information to its workforce and the entire population. We expect that there are already procedures for things like this, we therefore suggest an update on those procedures to identify for example the various information needs, audiences with such needs, and the most cost effective way to reach them. In practical terms, such a research exercise will answer questions like 'which type of media works well for the different age groups, sexes, social status, ethnic groups, geographical locations ? and what is the preferred form of media to be used for each identified audience group.
This research can be carried out as final year project works of tertiary students to reduce the burden on Ghana's overstretched health workforce and give these students practical work experience while in school. Where and when this research has been conducted, it must be implemented, monitored and evaluated to ensure that the health of all 25 million Ghanaians is being protected as well as see to it that results are being achieved.
Additionally, Olime Health believes MOH needs to collaborate more with the Ministry of Information and Media relations to help disseminate information. It should also collaborate with the ministry of Communication and Technology on how internet usage can be improved to reach the entire population as well as make internet usage affordable for most if not all citizens of Ghana. Other private organizations should also be made partners in securing the health of Ghana. This proposal stems from the recognized fact that the task of securing the health of a nation is a multi-sectoral project as this approach achieves better and faster results.
Today, we can heave a sigh of relief knowing that there's no outbreak of Ebola in Ghana and health personnel like my dear friend's mother and the general population were not put at risk. But tomorrow can we?
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About Olime Health
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Olime Health is a total health brand on a mission of enabling people to choose and
live healthier lifestyles. The brand advocates for an environment which encourages and supports the health and nutritional wellbeing of people. We approach health from a preventive angle and specialize in research, advocacy, monitoring and evaluation, nutritional assessments, food security and interventions.
PHOTO; uq.edu
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This is Part 2 of Olime Health's analysis of the 2014 State of the Nation address.
Highlights;
- The Government of Ghana is seeking to build a resilient economy to improve and protect the wellbeing of Ghanaians. In order to achieve this, the people of Ghana must be healthy because a healthy people are the major drivers of economic activity.
- Government’s commitment to health is assessed by analyzing sources such as the State of the Nation Address and the budget statement on health among others.
- Though the Government’s stated intention to improve the health delivery system to ensure quality health for all Ghanaians is in the right direction, an action plan to help measure progress is missing. The efforts to improve the health information system are not strong enough and the adequacy of the budget allocation for the health sector is debatable.
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Download Olime Health's analysis of the 2014 State of the Nation address here. Unfortunately, the download link is not available when using a MOBILE. We are working to rectify this. In the meantime you can request for this analysis by sending us an email to olimehealth@gmail.com and we will respond ASAP. We apologise for any inconvenience caused. Thank you.
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3 comments:
Thanks Olime Health for providing this analysis.
What I gathered from reading your analysis is what I call "The problem with our government"- Ghana does not lack ideas there are a lot of good ideas but how to implement it. Just as stated a strong political will is lacking in making what sounds so sweet on paper a beautiful reality.
Looking the challenge to deliver health and health finance I will say the our leaders just have the country priorities misplaced. More than 1000 students annually apply to tertiary institutions for health programs and just a few are admitted because the government cannot provide for all of them. Is it true that the government does not have enough resources to train health professionals or they will rather use the money for something else?
Thanks for the read PlanPregnancy and good questions you have raised. Check out the 2nd issue of this report, some of questions have been addressed.
Hello, thank you for taking time to produce this report. It gives some crucial perspectives on the health sector in Ghana. The language used in this report was very clear and the information well-structured so it was easy to understand. I appreciate your focus on the need to stress more on the preventive rather than treatment as this is surely the way to go. Also, your pointing out the need to pay attention to NCDs is crucial as changing lifestyle patterns will inevitably affect health outcomes.
Would it be possible to contact the relevant state authorities directly for extra information not available on their websites? I appreciate the difficulty in gleaning data from public sources in Ghana sometimes, but it may well be worth the effort. On the issue of HIS, I think we should leverage on our growing expertise in the ICT sector to streamline various systems. This is something that can be solved in Ghana. Check out how ClaimSync simplifies health insurance claims processing for instance. Finally, in terms of finances, my proposal, in addition to expanding the revenue base, would be to prioritise projects. What're our critical needs at this moment?
I look forward to reading the concluding report. It'd be interesting to draw a matrix based on the reports and track project as we go along. Well done!
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