Project Name：Health Information Management Efficiency Enhancement Project in Somaliland

Project status：Projects in Operation

Cooperating Country：Africa, Somaliland

Project Description：

Somaliland’s Second Phase Health Sector Strategic Plan (HSSP II) 2017-2021 states that the Health Management Information System (HMIS) is expected to “provide accurate and real-time health information, be used as a tool to solve problems, and provide evidence‑based data for planning and intervention,” and aims to produce quarterly reports and increase management efficiency. However, the degree of digitization of health facilities in Somaliland is not high at present. Hospital operations are mostly manual, and some systems developed by international organizations or non-governmental organizations based on project requirements have not been effective. The country still lacks a health information system that meets the actual needs of hospitals. In addition, hospital operating procedures are complicated, showing that hospital management capabilities have yet to be improved. This project will be jointly implemented with Kaohsiung Medical University Chung-Ho Memorial Hospital to assist in developing an integrated health information system (HIS) according to the needs of identified hospitals in Somaliland, building capability of hospital personnel, and enhancing health information system efficiency. The system will also be able to upload reliable medical records to the Ministry of Health Development, and solve the problem of data collection and utilization of the Ministry. The main project contents are as follows: 1. Strengthen e-health system functions; and 2. Strengthen hospital management.

Implementation Start Date：2022-03-29

Implementation End Date：2027-03-28

Project Objectives：

A. Strengthen ehealth system functions
  (A). Conduct training for software developers and system administrators to maintain the HIS operation
       a. Conduct training for sotrware developers and system administrators to maintain the HIS operation
       b. Conduct at least 5 training sessions for system administration, to train at least 10 officers from the identified hospitals Taiwanese consultants will conduct field trainings 5 times.
  (B). Develop an integrated HIS, which is capable of exchanging data and satisfies the needs of identified hospitals
       a. Develop an integrated HIS that fits the need of the identified hospitals and is capable of exchanging data, and implement to the outpatient and emergency departments of the 5 identified hospitals.
       b. Conduct at least 5 training sessions in the identified hospitals to train at least 10 HIS system usage seed istructors.
       c. Guide the seed instructors at the identified hospitals to conduct training in their hospitals, to train at least total of 350 HIS users.
  (C). Improve the info-structure of Ministry of Health Development and identified hospitals
       a. Install and setup a total of 6 server rooms and servers in the MOHD and the identified hospitals. 
       b. Install and setup the 5 identified hospitals' computers, local area network, to ensure the hospitals can use HIS to ccapture data and upload to the central server. 
B. Strengthen hospital management
  (A). Invite 2 policy makers to visit Taiwan to observe its health management policies for 1 week, and to assist in promoting the standard hospital management procedures after returning to Somaliland. 
  (B). Invite 2 health management officers to receive trainings in Taiwan for at least 2 weeks, and propose a draft health management standard operation procedure (HMSOP) during the training session, and assist the identified hospitals to implement the HMSOP after returning to Somaliland. 
  (C). Conduct at least 5 hospital management trainings in the identifies hospitals, to train at least 20 hospital healthcare management personnel.
  (D). Conduct 2 seminars to share the outcome and experience of implementing HIS.

Executing Agency：

TaiwanICDF/Ministry of Health Development, Somaliland /Kaohsiung Medical University Chung-Ho Memorial Hospital

Implementation Arrangement：

Members of the Project will provide technical assistance and assistance for capacity building.

Current Progress：

To the end of March 2025, the following activities have been carried out:

1. Developed of the “Somaliland Health Information System (SHIS),” which includes not only the outpatient and emergency modules but also AI-generated medical records, chronic disease, psychiatry, and dental modules, all integrated with the laboratory system.
2. Established information equipment and network infrastructure at the Ministry of Health Development and four regional-level hospitals, introduced “Somaliland Health Information System (SHIS)” to the hospitals, enabling the selected hospitals to automatically upload data daily to the central server of the Ministry.
3. Accumulated a total of 166,312 electronic medical records and 246,308 electronic outpatient visit records through SHIS.
4. Conducted 49 training sessions, with a total of 1,012 participants trained.
5. Held 6 promotion events, reaching a total of 590 participants.
6. Invited 2 high-level policy-makers from the Ministry of Health Development to visit Taiwan.
7. Invited 3 medical administrators from the Ministry of Health Development to receive training in Taiwan.
8. Completed one satisfaction survey report on the system.
9. Completed one report on the quality assurance mechanism for health information.
10. Provided 6 epidemiological surveillance reports to the Ministry of Health Development.
11. Provided monthly visualized reports to the Ministry of Health Development and the selected hospitals.

Project Performance：

An improvement in managerial efficiency within identified hospitals in Somaliland.

Project Contact：Jafit Ting

Phone：+886-2-2873-2323#6060

E-mail：c.y.ting@icdf.org.tw

Signing Date：2022-03-29

Mission：Taiwan Technical Mission in the Republic of Somaliland