Electronic health (eHealth) refers to the health sector’s use of information and communication technologies (ICT) such as mobile phones, portable and handheld computers, Internet and cloud-based applications, open source software, and data warehouses. Advances in ICT have increased exponentially the amount of data that health information systems can collect, synthesize, and report. Expansion of these technologies in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) promises to revolutionize the global health sector’s response to these countries’ most pressing health issues.
MEASURE Evaluation seeks new ways to exploit such eHealth solutions as data dashboards and geospatial data analysis, as part of its mandate to strengthen health systems in low-resource settings. Even though health program managers in LMICs—as everywhere—are increasingly expected to use and invest in such strategies, many lack information about how the strategies work and how they can benefit the management of health programs.
To address this problem, we developed this glossary of eHealth strategies most likely to enhance data access, synthesis, and communication for health program managers at all levels of a health system who are eHealth novices.
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App Competitions
App competitions are a subset of hackathons. They are also known as app challenges. These contests challenge participants to produce computer or mobile applications to meet defined objectives and criteria. Usually, prizes are awarded to participants who develop the best applications
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Crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing has been used increasingly in global health. Crowdsourcing for knowledge discovery appears to be a promising tool to facilitate the management of health programs globally.
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Dashboards
Dashboards are linked to one or more data sources, most commonly relational databases that store data and populate the dashboard on a routine basis. Well-designed dashboards pull together data from various sources and analyze and present them in formats useful to decision makers.
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Data Science and Big Data
The world is generating an ever-growing mountain of data. In 2020, the amount of data the world generates will be 20 times greater than the amount generated in 2011. Data science is an emerging field that capitalizes on this growing data environment and emphasizes creative uses of data to discover the stories that data contain.
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Geospatial Analysis
Geospatial analysis can be described as the use of geographic data to identify spatial relationships, patterns, and trends in data. This can include statistical methods, spatial statistics techniques, or the layering of different geographically coded data sets in order to discover geographic patterns in data using a geographic information system, or GIS.
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Hackathons
Hackathons are short-term events that bring together technology professionals of various affiliations to create something that previously did not exist. MEASURE Evaluation is exploring how hackathons can address data gaps and support decision making in HIV programs.
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Data Interoperability and Data Integration
Data interoperability and integration enable multiple systems to communicate with one another and exchange data. These strategies have long been part of efforts to strengthen national health information systems. Now, with the proliferation of electronic health information systems, they are being applied within global health information systems.
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Open Data
Open data is data that “anyone is free to access, use, modify, and share.” Open data are “public” data. They help citizens, governments, the private sector, and others easily access data to see trends in disease patterns, service coverage, and financing that might not be visible otherwise.
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