INTEGRATED HEALTH INFORMATION PLATFORM: AN ANALYSIS OF FUTURE POTENTIAL, CHALLENGES, AND GAPS FOR MADHYA PRADESH, INDIA

Abstract

India still has one of the world’s greatest burdens of infectious illnesses, driven by variables such as massive population, significant poverty, subpar sanitation, and impedances in access to basic health care. To overcome this burden, the Integrated Disease Monitoring Project (IDSP), funded by the World Bank, was established by the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare in November 2004 to strengthen the country’s monitoring and response system. Several challenges in the effective utilization of IDSP and the need for elaborated epidemiological data for quick response led to the development and design of a novel Integrated Health Information Platform (IHIP). This platform’s future impacts include better surveillance coverage, improved continuous monitoring, better-automated analysis, visualization and displaying of near-real-time data, and closed network linkage of various reporting units such as field staff, medical officers, and laboratory personnel. Data collection under IDSP was paper-based and it produced a weekly surveillance report this includes case-centric data with demographic, clinical, and laboratory details, and links it with IDSP’s S, P, and L formats. Developed by the Government of India, with the support from the WHO, this platform integrates the electronic health records of individuals from all parts of India, allowing greater continuity of the treatment, secure and confidential storage of data/records, enhanced illness diagnostics, reduction, and even prevention of medical errors. This paper is intended to study this novel IHIP model of the Government of India, highlight its current challenges, propose possible solutions, and predict future possibilities.