TY - JOUR
T1 - Feasibility of electronic health information and surveillance system (eHISS) for disease symptom monitoring
T2 - A case of rural Ghana
AU - Mohammed, Aliyu
AU - Franke, Konstantin
AU - Okyere, Portia Boakye
AU - Brinkel, Johanna
AU - Marinovic, Axel Bonačić
AU - Kreuels, Benno
AU - Krumkamp, Ralf
AU - Fobil, Julius
AU - May, Jürgen
AU - Owusu-Dabo, Ellis
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Mohammed et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2018/5
Y1 - 2018/5
N2 - Introduction The current surge of mobile phone use in many African countries creates the opportunity to provide caregivers with limited access to the health care system with vital health recommendations. At the same time such communication system can be utilised to collect tempero-spatial data on disease symptoms. Objective We assessed the feasibility of an mHealth system among caregivers with children under-five years, designed as a health information and surveillance tool in a rural district of Ghana. Methods A mobile phone-based electronic health information and surveillance system was piloted from February to December 2015. Toll-free numbers were provided to 1446 caregivers, which they could call to receive health advice in case their children showed disease symptoms. The system was setup to evaluate the illness of a sick child. Symptoms reported via the system were evaluated and compared to clinician’s report after follow-up. Cogency of the reported symptoms was assessed using Cohen’s kappa coefficient. Results A total of 169 children with disease symptoms were identified based on phone calls from caregivers. The predominant reported symptoms were fever (64%; n = 108), cough (55%; n = 93) and diarrhoea (33%; n = 55). Temporal pattern of symptomatic cases revealed a peak saturation in the month of September, with fever registering the highest number of symptoms observed. Reported symptoms and clinician’s report revealed a very good agreement for fever (95%, kappa = 0.89); good for diarrhoea (87%, kappa = 0.73) and moderate for cough (76%, kappa = 0.49). Conclusion This pilot concept, has demonstrated the practicality of using mobile phones for assessing childhood disease symptoms and encouraging caregivers to seek early treatment for their children if needed. The strategy to use mobile phones in disease surveillance and treatment support is a promising strategy especially for areas with limited access to the health care system.
AB - Introduction The current surge of mobile phone use in many African countries creates the opportunity to provide caregivers with limited access to the health care system with vital health recommendations. At the same time such communication system can be utilised to collect tempero-spatial data on disease symptoms. Objective We assessed the feasibility of an mHealth system among caregivers with children under-five years, designed as a health information and surveillance tool in a rural district of Ghana. Methods A mobile phone-based electronic health information and surveillance system was piloted from February to December 2015. Toll-free numbers were provided to 1446 caregivers, which they could call to receive health advice in case their children showed disease symptoms. The system was setup to evaluate the illness of a sick child. Symptoms reported via the system were evaluated and compared to clinician’s report after follow-up. Cogency of the reported symptoms was assessed using Cohen’s kappa coefficient. Results A total of 169 children with disease symptoms were identified based on phone calls from caregivers. The predominant reported symptoms were fever (64%; n = 108), cough (55%; n = 93) and diarrhoea (33%; n = 55). Temporal pattern of symptomatic cases revealed a peak saturation in the month of September, with fever registering the highest number of symptoms observed. Reported symptoms and clinician’s report revealed a very good agreement for fever (95%, kappa = 0.89); good for diarrhoea (87%, kappa = 0.73) and moderate for cough (76%, kappa = 0.49). Conclusion This pilot concept, has demonstrated the practicality of using mobile phones for assessing childhood disease symptoms and encouraging caregivers to seek early treatment for their children if needed. The strategy to use mobile phones in disease surveillance and treatment support is a promising strategy especially for areas with limited access to the health care system.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85047480424&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0197756
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0197756
M3 - Article
C2 - 29795626
AN - SCOPUS:85047480424
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 13
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
IS - 5
M1 - e0197756
ER -