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Abstract
Application of GIS Technology in Health Service Management
Kabindra Joshi
GIS Officer
CARE International In Nepal
Nepal
Email: kabindra@carenepal.org
Balrma Bhui
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that GIS technology could be an effective tool to improve health service management. The paper examines some of uses of GIS in health such as visual analysis of health management information, health service mapping and geographic analysis of health services and its coverage. GIS help program manager monitor performance and prioritize program area for interventionsTabular data becomes difficult to analyze and draw conclusions when it is large with common computer program such as Excel. With GIS we can easily map different health areas by their performance in a piece of map. It becomes easy to understand how different health areas stand against each other and also suggests if any geographic pattern exist. For example, Mahottari district has 77 health areas. A health program manger would need to spend significant amount of time and energy to understand the health service coverage of different health areas with Excel and would need to spend additional time and energy to understand the geographic distribution. With GIS the manager has both the information – what is the performance and where they are located – at the same time in same piece of paper. Having two maps of two or more period of time, the program managers can understand what health area improved, remained same or performed bad over period of comparison.The health program managers often need prioritization to make decision of allocating scare resources. Given the volume of problem areas and given the limited resources available, a best decision need be made. GIS permits interactive queries of information contained within the map, table or graph.GIS coupled with GPS can be used to mapping health services and its assessment. The public and NGO health workers often develop and work on social map for micro planning of routine health service delivery and national immunization campaigns. The maps drawn are a sketch on paper and do not show the relative position of population and health service center on scale.
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