09 – Strengthening Information Systems and Linkages to Care

It is important to be very clear about what exactly a TB programme requires the information system to do. To this end, the programme must be very specific about the patient journey, variables to be collected at each step of the journey, who collects the data, what the reports should look like, and who will be using the system for collection, validation and analysis. Often, the software developers formalize these aspects in a requirements document following extensive consultation with the programme. This document provides the blueprint for the software development team to create the system. The more clarity there is around the needs of the TB programme, the greater the chances that the early versions of the developed system will meet those needs. It is critical to remember that software developers may not understand TB control and so the information passed to them needs to be as detailed as possible.

It is also important to understand and document who has access to what data. In general, a good guiding principle is that a user should have access to the data they need to do their job and not more. For programmes using mobile tools for data collection, offline connectivity is usually an important requirement so that work can continue unimpeded for the most part in situations where connectivity is not available.