Mobile Data Collection Needs

Nii Okai Quaye Independent Software Developer Free and Opensource Software naut23@gmail.com

Mobile Data Collection

Introduction Monitoring and evaluation project Traffic Analysis in Urban Ghana Childcount plus Rural medical laboratory services Data collection needs Summary

Introduction

The need to gather one form of data or the other is common in most organizations Traditionally done through manual paper based data collection Paper based data collection has many challenges

Error prone process Costly and time consuming Inability to provide real-time information Web /Mobile based solutions

Need to automate cannot to be overemphasized

Monitoring Evaluation

Mobile based data monitoring based on ODK Solved most of the problems for the users The cost of the android devices required by ODK then was prohibitive for implementors Compromised by using netbooks with inbuilt gsm modem providing GPRS Android emulator Now migrated to android

Traffic Analysis in Urban Ghana

Mobile data collection of all traffic lights status Enumerators would sit at home and send a yes or know Needed to enforce GPS location together with the gathered data Data collected over a period of time would be subjected to some algorithms together with other information to predict traffic trends Again used ODK

ChildCount Plus

Millennium Villages project Maternal and child welfare Field based community health workers(CHW) SMS based data collection Based on Rapidsms Registration of children under five and pregnant women Malnutrition (MUAC) RDT (malaria) Analytics CHW household visits

Medical Laboratory Service

Clinics established in remote areas Serviced by one lab Samples collected at clinics and sent by despatch riders Long distance between clinics and lab means results are delayed Sends request via sms Samples verified against requests on arrival Results sent via sms Wxpython desktop clinic and lab modules Childcount plus intermediary server OpenMRS medical records

Needs Analysis
Automated mobile based data collection

Transmission medium Dynamic forms creation

Xforms SMS/Key word based forms Constraints Skip logic Reduced costs Produce

Data integrity and quality of data

Design with analysis and report in mind Web based administration and report views