iHRIS Software to Track Health Workers in Botswana

CapacityPlus is working to strengthening Botswana's capacity to manage and use health worker information, including training dedicated iHRIS administrators, as well as training most of the administrators within the Ministry in basic use of the system. Organisers say the next step will be rolling out iHRIS to the districts, and integrating iHRIS into Botswana's larger health information system.

iHRIS Manage is the human resources (HR) management component of the iHRIS Suite. Organisers say that using iHRIS Manage, decision-makers at the Ministry of Health, district health office or health care facility can collect, manage, and analyse detailed information about employed health workers and applications. Because it is open source, it can be modified to meet a specific country's or organisation's needs.

Using the system, an HR professional can create a hierarchy of positions based on standard job titles, classifications, and descriptions, even for positions spread over diverse geographic locations. It can be used for staffing, including tracking job applications and open positions, and can track each employee's detailed history. The system can also produce standard or customised reports that can be analysed by decision-makers to answer a wide variety of policy and management questions.

According to CapacityPlus, another benefit of the system is the ability to manage health worker training, which will make it easier for the Ministry to identify the workers eligible for certain courses. It will also be possible to see which workers are working in areas they are not trained for.

Health care, New technology