Data Science for Health Decision Making

Author(s): MEASURE Evaluation

Year: 2015

Abstract:

Data science is a tool relatively new to the field of public health. The public health field is just beginning to explore what data science can do to improve health outcomes. Data science is the process of finding, developing, and communicating actionable information that stems from multiple  sources. For instance, data science might bring together information from household surveys, routine health information systems (RHIS), and  non-traditional sources like mobile phone data to model outbreaks of disease or predict effects of health interventions.

MEASURE Evaluation is exploring the potential of data science to strengthen health systems and improve monitoring and evaluation and more generally yield previously unobtainable, policy-relevant, actionable information. We are identifying best practices for data science in global health, and developing tools that facilitate the management, analysis, and communication of data using the data science framework.