Enabling Semantic Interoperability of Regional Trends of Disease Surveillance Data for Namibia Through a Health-Standards-Based Approach

Abstract

The Ministry of Health and Social Services in Namibia under the division of epidemiology uses a manual paper-based approach to capture disease surveillance data through 5 levels of reporting which include the community level, the health facility level, the district level, and the national level. As a result, this method of communicating and exchanging disease surveillance information is cost and time consuming, which delay disease surveillance information from reaching the head office on time. The current method that is being used to exchange and communicate disease surveillance data is a manual process which very time consuming due to the fact that surveillance officers have to organise and store the files and hunt down the information when it is needed and this can take time. Therefore, the study developed a prototype that aggregates disease surveillance data from the 14 regions in Namibia and can thus enable the disease service office to capture disease surveillance data through the use of mobile devices. The functionality of the prototype would allow a disease surveillance office in one regional office to access disease surveillance data of other regional office in real time. The method used to communicate disease surveillance data is through the excel spreadsheet (IDSR) which is called the integrated disease surveillance and response. Furthermore, the excel file will be sent to the relevant authority through email. However, we still do not have a web based system to report cases of diseases, instead this is a process starting from the intermediate hospital disease surveillance data which is captured then sent to the regional office and from the regional office the information is sent to the district office and then sent to the national office and from the national office the information is further sent to the WHO and other development partners as well as to the top management or to the highest authority. So it does not end at the national level but goes to management such as the Permanent Secretary, and the data is used to inform the development partners and the national surveillance office prepares official letters to the management as a form of reporting disease surveillance data. The symphonic surveillance office helps to detect a particular disease. The doctors send an investigation case form to the laboratory for testing the disease that has been identified.