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The burden of recording and reporting health data in primary health care facilities in five low- and lower-middle income countries
- Source :
- BMC Health Services Research, Vol 21, Iss S1, Pp 1-9 (2021), BMC Health Services Research
- Publication Year :
- 2021
- Publisher :
- BMC, 2021.
-
Abstract
- Background Recording and reporting health data in facilities is the backbone of routine health information systems which provide data collected by health facility workers during service provision. Data is firstly collected in a register, to record patient health data and care process, and tallied into nationally designed reporting forms. While there is anecdotal evidence of large numbers of registers and reporting forms for primary health care (PHC) facilities, there are few systematic studies to document this potential burden on health workers. This multi-country study aimed to document the numbers of registers and reporting forms use at the PHC level and to estimate the time it requires for health workers to meet data demands. Methods In Cambodia, Ghana, Mozambique, Nigeria and Tanzania, a desk review was conducted to document registers and reporting forms mandated at the PHC level. In each country, visits to 16 randomly selected public PHC facilities followed to assess the time spent on paper-based recording and reporting. Information was collected through self-reports of estimated time use by health workers, and observation of 1360 provider-patient interactions. Data was primarily collected in outpatient care (OPD), antenatal care (ANC), immunization (EPI), family planning (FP), HIV and Tuberculosis (TB) services. Result Cross-countries, the average number of registers was 34 (ranging between 16 and 48). Of those, 77% were verified in use and each register line had at least 20 cells to be completed per patient. The mean time spent on recording was about one-third the total consultation time for OPD, FP, ANC and EPI services combined. Cross-countries, the average number of monthly reporting forms was 35 (ranging between 19 and 52) of which 78% were verified in use. The estimated time to complete monthly reporting forms was 9 h (ranging between 4 to 15 h) per month per health worker. Conclusions PHC facilities are mandated to use many registers and reporting forms pausing a considerable burden to health workers. Service delivery systems are expected to vary, however an imperative need remains to invest in international standards of facility-based registers and reporting forms, to ensure regular, comparable, quality-driven facility data collection and use.
- Subjects :
- medicine.medical_specialty
Health worker
Service delivery framework
Health Personnel
Review
Health informatics
Ambulatory Care Facilities
Health administration
Health facility
Ambulatory care
Pregnancy
Time motion
medicine
Humans
Developing Countries
Primary Health Care
business.industry
Health Policy
Nursing research
Public health
Data Collection
Reporting forms
Registers
Public PHC facilities
Family planning
Family medicine
Female
Health Facilities
Public aspects of medicine
RA1-1270
business
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 14726963
- Volume :
- 21
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- BMC Health Services Research
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....35571af3b7b2c60c06a276d6d6a0b6f2