THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH, WELLNESS AND ELDERLY AFFAIRS THROUGH THE HEALTH MANAGEMENT INFORMATION UNIT (HMIU) HAS BEEN EMBARKING ON A MISSION TO ENHANCE ITS DATA REPORTING ENVIRONMENT TO FACILITATE MORE EVIDENCE-BASED DECISIONS.

The Ministry of Health, Wellness and Elderly Affairs through the Health Management Information Unit (HMIU) has been embarking on a mission to enhance its data reporting environment to facilitate more evidence-based decisions.  The Saint Lucia Health Information System (SLUHIS) is the flagship information system for primary healthcare and currently facilitates electronic medical records for patients visiting the various wellness centres. 

 

Dr. Prabhjot Singh, PAHO Advisor for Health Surveillance, Disease Prevention and Control, and Mr. Reynold Hewitt, PAHO Country Programme Specialist, as part of their biennial work plan has provided assistance to the HMIU to facilitate this initiative.  Dominica-based Open Solutions for Health (OS4H) lead by Mr. Peter Ricketts, was awarded the consultancy and they have been working closely with the Health Management Information Unit led by Information Systems Manager, Mrs. Gisele Jn Baptiste-Cadette. The project will also benefit the Environmental Health Department which currently runs on the District Health Information Systems version 2 (DHIS2) platform.  Thus, the objectives of the project are as follows:

 

• Create dashboards and related charts to provide real-time data for evidence-based decision making;
• Connect DHIS2 system to the St. Lucia Health Information System (SLUHIS);
• Capture and report the requirements to enable the development of a standard module in DHIS2 for Arboviruses including epidemiology, laboratory and vector related forms, reports, and dashboards;
• Upgrade the current instance of DHIS2 to the latest stable version.

 

As the first component of the project, the DHIS2 platform has been integrated with SLUHIS which is the reliable source for all data and child immunization. Visualization data has been included on the dashboard as a priority area and officially went live on 20^th April 2023. This is a monumental milestone as the HMIU endeavor to include other visualizations for other significant areas.