Improving Health Systems: Influence of Technical Capacities of Community Health Volunteers on Use of Community Health Information Systems in Kenya
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Date
2018-07
Authors
Mambo, Susan Njoki
Odhiambo-Otieno, George W.
Ochieng’- Otieno, George
MwauraTenermbergen, Wanja
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
IJCA
Abstract
WHO identified six key pillars of an effective health system
namely: leadership and governance; service delivery; health
workforce; health information systems; medical products,
vaccines and technologies and healthcare financing. This
study focused on Community-based Health Management
Information System (CbHMIS) of health information pillar. A
Community-based Health Management Information System
(CbHMIS) is a type of health information system based in the
rural community and informal settlements of urban areas.
CbHMIS’s main objective among others is to produce
relevant and quality information to support decision making
on public health issues at the community level. The
importance of effective information use is still a key
impediment to achievement of goals at level one of health
care delivery. According to a situation analysis on the state of
Community Health Services in year 2014, the functionality of
CbHMIS was said to be at 64% which came down
considerably to 55% in year 2015 documented by USAID,
and that access to quality data was not guaranteed through the
current CbHMIS.Lack of technical capacities among the
CHVs is a serious gap in achievement of information use in
Kenya.This study aimed at establishing the factors influencing
technical capacities of community health volunteers on use of
CbHMIS in Kenya.Other objectives of this study were: To
establish the influence of System Availability on CbHMIS
use; to find out effects of availability of skills to CHVs on
CbHMIS use, To assess the influence of personnel knowledge
on CbHMIS use, To identify competencies of CHVs that
influence CbHMIS use. The selected counties were Kiambu,
Kajiado and Nairobi which gave a rural, urban and peri-urban
representation respectively of the country. This was a crosssectional analytical study design, with both quantitative and
qualitative data collection methods. The target population was
156 active Community Units (CUs) from the 3 counties where
a total sample of 122CUs (50 in Kiambu; 26 from Kajiado
and 46 from Nairobi CUs) was derived using Mugenda and
Mugenda formula of populations less than 10,000. Multistage
sampling was used to identify the CUs; Systematic random
sampling was used to identify total of 366 respondents
3Community Health Volunteers (CHVs) were purposively
sampled form each CU to make a total of 366 (150 in
Kiambu; 78 from Kajiado and 138 from Nairobi. A total of 6
KIIs (two from each county) and 3 FGDs (one from each
county) were conducted for qualitative data. Interviewer
administered questionnaires were used to collect quantitative
data, observation checklist was also used. Quantitative data
was analyzed using SPSS to generate univariate and bivariate
analysis at p<0.05 significance level. Qualitative data was
analyzed using content analysis based on key themes
generated from the objectives. Results were presented in form
of graphs, tables, figures, and narration. Use of Cb-HMIS
stood at 56.6%. Slightly above half 51% of respondents
agreed to having technical skills on CbHMIS, However a KII
noted that “….We have challenges in training all our CHVs
and refresher trainings due to funding so you will find some
have been partially trained….”.There was statistical
significant differences between group means (F(2,363) =
32.47,p = .000). (X1) explains 28.6% of the total variations in
the use of CbHMIS (R
2
=.286). This implies that the use of
CBHMIS by Community Units (CU) improves significantly
when the CU personnel have better technical capacities
Description
article
Keywords
Health Systems Strengthening, Community Based – Health Management Information system, Use of CBHMIS, Technical capacity factors
Citation
Mambo, S. N., Odhiambo-Otieno, G. W., Ochieng’-Otieno, G., & Tenermbergen, W. M. (2018). Improving Health Systems: Influence of Technical Capacities of Community Health Volunteers on Use of Community Health Information Systems in Kenya.