My name is Chipo Chitambi. I am a Senior Strategic Information Officer working for the Center for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ).
I will be presenting in the Session titled “Using Tracker across disease programs”. It will be on Monday 20 June, 14:15 - 15:30.
Below is a summary of my presentation.
Background
The Expanded Program in Immunization (EPI) is among the many programs led by the World Health Organization (WHO) that is focused on making vaccines available to all children throughout the world. In Zambia, the Expanded Program on Immunization-Optimization (EPI-OPT) program under the Ministry of Health (MOH) has been supporting immunization services across the country. The aim has been to eliminate mortality and morbidity among children against the most common vaccine-preventable diseases. This is jointly implemented by the MOH and other Implementing Partners. The Center for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ) has the specific aim of improving program monitoring, data visibility and use of data for continuous improvement. However, the use of paper data collection makes it difficult to monitor and track the performance of health facilities in remote areas. There is a need for a centralized electronic data system that monitors adherence to vaccine management standards
Method
An event capture program implemented on the android application was created to collect data on health facilities’ responses to a vaccine management checklist. The checklist is answered every month during a vaccine distribution and technical assistance visit. The data is collected on tablets which are offline due to the remote locations of most of the facilities and it is later synchronized to the server. The DHIS2 server is centrally hosted at the CIDRZ headquarters. The data is then extracted and used by the program staff to monitor and focus on facilities that are not meeting vaccine management standards. Data Review meetings are held every quarter with representatives from all the districts and the various issues indicated by the data are discussed and solutions are planned.
Results
The Android implementation of the vaccine management checklist has been used in 252 facilities in 13 Districts of the Southern Province. The Checklist is used during the monthly mentoring visits that are carried out. Since November 2019, 5010 mentoring visits have been recorded. The digital collection of this data and the regular data review meetings have improved the analysis and monitoring of facility vaccination practices which in turn has improved the immunization coverage rates in Southern province.
Conclusion
The DHIS2 Android implementation program has improved and eased the compilation of data on vaccine management in various facilities. This has led to the ability to use the data to improve immunization rates due to the monitoring of facility adherence to vaccine standards.
