January-April 2016
The official publication of the Asia eHealth Information Network
Leaders at the AeHIN Visioning Workshop and Strategic Implementation Planning held in Bangkok, Thailand
AeHIN holds Visioning Workshop, Strategic Implemenation Planning Bangkok, Thailand - AeHIN Visioning Workshop and Strategic Planning was organized by Asian Development Bank (ADB), in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF), and other development partners. Fifty-four participants from 12 countries attended the event which was held at Anantara Siam Bangkok Hotel, Bangkok, Thailand on 6-7 April, 2016. The objectives were to set the goals for AeHIN as a not-for-profit entity, define the strategy, visualize and support the preparations for the activities during 2016 - 2017, to facilitate a regional approach towards sharing of experiences, lessons learned and good practices among AeHIN members to effectively support their
national eHealth development roadmap with a special focus on Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam (CLMV) countries and to schedule the launch of country missions and capacity-building activities. It engaged members and experts in various aspects on eHealth: eHealth governance framework, eHealth capacity development, regional capacity building through AeHIN Regional Enterprise Architecture Council for Health (AeHIN REACH), Community of Interoperability Lab (COIL), DHIS 2 in the country, the importance of 3 Cs (Communicating, Collaborating, and Coordinating), eHealth research, and immunization registry. AeHIN updated the available service packages to member countries, shared experiences and discussed
Ministries of Health Offer Architects to AeHIN Six Asian ministries of health and academic institutions agreed to pool their enterprise architects under the Asia eHealth Information Network’s Regional Enterprise Architecture Council for Health (AeHIN REACH). The REACH was launched at the Asia eHealth Information Network’s Interoperability Forum in Manila last August 2015. There are presently 12 TOGAF certified enteprise architects in
AeHIN distributed among five countries in Asia. Most are officials from Ministries of Health (Mongolia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Philippines) while others are from development agencies and the academe (Bangladesh, Philipines, and Thailand). The REACH will be a pool of experts to advise countries on proven enterprise architecture that they can apply to their national health information systems.
the way forward addressing to specific country needs; AeHIN GIS Lab, Thailand Medicines Terminology (TMT), Program management, and SNOMED CT Cardiology Reference Set Development (Malaysia) are also highlighted in the two days workshop. Representatives from Member countries’ Ministry of Health personnel acknowledged the importance and support the eHealth/HIS strengthening strategy and eHealth governance development was recognized as the essential component of the country eHealth/HIS development. Presentations are available on AeHIN HingX and the event pictures can be found in AeHIN Social Media page
In this Issue: • • • •
AeHIN supports Bangladesh MA4Health Conference 2016 AeHIN, Measure Evaluation conduct RHIS Focus Group Side-meeting AeHIN COIL, HISSL, OpenMRS hold OpenMRS Online Training AeHIN Enterprise Architects Select OpenHIE for Lab Testing 1
AeHIN supports Bangladesh MA4Health Conference 2016
Participants at the Inter-Country Conference on MA4Health held in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Dhaka, Bangladesh—The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MOHFW) and the Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh, supported by the Asia eHealth Information Network, USAID, WHO, and GIZ, held an Inter-Country Conference on Measurement and Accountability for Health (MA4Health) last April 26-28. Prof. Abul Kalam Azad, MOHFW additional director general, led the conference which centered on facilitating regional and country response to data needs, engaging with development partners to improve health data systems, and sharing and strengthening
country-led M&E plans. The first two days of the conference were dedicated to technical sessions while the last day was dedicated to fieldtrips where participants were able to observe the work being done in Bangladesh’s health information systems and capacity-building programs. This came after two previous MA4Health conferences held in 2015 at Washington, D.C. and Bali, Indonesia where commitments and initiatives in implementing the Country Roadmap for Health Measurement and Accountability and responses to the 5-Point Call to Action were given.
AeHIN, MEASURE Evaluation conduct RHIS Focus Group side-meeting Dhaka, Bangladesh – To support RHIS (Routine Health Information Systems) strengthening in Asia, the Asia eHealth Information Network (AeHIN) in collaboration with the MEASURE Evaluation conducted a side-meeting dedicated for the RHIS Focus Group during the Bangladesh MA4Health Conference on April 26, 2016. The RHIS Focus Group is a regional collaboration platform established by AeHIN to forward RHIS initiatives in Asia. Hence, the side-meeting aims to convene regional representatives of the conference to talk about draft action plans agreed upon in the 4th AeHIN General Meeting in Bali, Indonesia last October 2015. The side-meeting also discussed the implementation of RHIS course developed by MEASURE Evaluation in collaboration with WHO, UoO, INSP, PHFI, and University
of Queensland, among others. With this regard, Professor Abul Kalam Azad, Additional Director General (Admin) & Director, Management Information System (MIS) of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare conveyed his interest to introduce the RHIS course in Bangladesh. The South African team also took interest in introducing the same course in Southern Africa. Consequently, AeHIN expressed its commitment to organize the RHIS course in collaboration with regional universities, with the technical support of MEASURE Evaluation. The side-meeting was attended by health information and CRVS representatives from Bangladesh, Myanmar, Philippines, and South Africa. Development partners from USAID, WHO, and University of Oslo, Norway were also present in the event.
AeHIN Enterprise Architects Select OpenHIE for Lab Testing The Regional Enterprise Architecture Council for Health (REACH) of the Asia eHealth Information Network has selected the OpenHIE architecture for testing by the Community of Interoperability Labs (COIL). Six months after the 4th General Meeting in Bali, REACH members have agreed to test the OpenHIE architecture in a lab setting. This means the AeHIN
Community of Interoperability Labs (COIL), a subnetwork of research institutions in AeHIN focusing on implementing interoperable architectures, will then be tasked to create solutions that are compliant to the OpenHIE architecture. The COIL will then demonstrate the test results in the 5th General Meeting in Nawpyidaw, Myanmar later this year.
AeHIN COIL, HISSL, OpenMRS hold OpenMRS Online Training As part of the AeHIN Country Interoperability Labs (COIL), the Health Informatics Society of Sri Lanka (HISSL) together with the OpenMRS launched the first of a series of capacity building programs on eHealth. They held the pilot webinar of its 5-session OpenMRS Online Training series on February 15. The webinar series is the first contribution of the HISSL to the AeHIN COIL. OpenMRS is an application which enables design of a customized medical records system with no programming knowledge (although medical and systems analysis knowledge is required). It is a common framework upon which medical informatics efforts in developing countries can be built. The whole AeHIN community is invited to participate and learn about this open source electronic medical record through this free online training which will run via WebEx Event Center. Two sessions have been held to date. Recordings of said webinars are accessible at aehin.org. More about AeHIN Community Interoperability Labs (CoIL)
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The AeHIN Community of Interoperability Labs is a collaboration of institutions from Asian countries interested in collaborating around the challenge of health information interoperability. They aim to serve as reference centers in their respective countries but also maintain strong links to each other to ensure regional Interoperability. Each country COIL member offers its own capacity building program and shares it with the rest of the network. Current COIL members are: 1. University of Gadjah Mada (Indonesia) 2. University of the Philippines Manila (Philippines) 3. Thai Health Information Standards development centre (Thailand) 4. Health Informatics Society of Sri Lanka (Sri Lanka) 5. Malaysia HIX (Malaysia)
The Hexagon is the quarterly newsletter of AeHIN. If you have eHealth updates and initiatives from your country that you would want to share with the network, feel free to drop us a message at secretariat@aehin.org. For more updates on AeHIN activities follow our social media accounts: Facebook: http://facebook.com/aehin| Twitter: @aehin2011 | Website: http://aehin.org
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