Health Informatics

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    Information Needs and Seeking Behavior among Health Professionals Working at Governmental Hospital and Health Centers in Bahir Dar Town, Amhara Region, Ethiopia.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2012-06) Andualem, Mulusew; Kumie, Abera(PhD); Kebede, Gashaw(PhD)
    Background: Universal access to information for health professionals is a pre requisite for meeting the MDGs and achieving health for all strategy. In developing countries, a large proportion of the population, including health professionals have no or only poor access to health information resources due to poor infrastructures, economic related, poor attention, etc Objective: The purpose of this study is to assess information needs and seeking behavior of health professionals working at Governmental Hospitals and Health Centers in Bahir Dar town, Amhara Region, Ethiopia. Methods: A cross sectional study design using quantitative and qualitative approaches was carried out to achieve the research objectives using 350 study participants. Self-administered questionnaire and observation checklist were instruments to collect the required data. Manually edited data were entered in to computer using Epi-info version 3.5.1; further cleaned and exported to SPSS statistics version19; then cleaned again and analyzed as needed. Frequencies, cross tabulation, chi-square, Odds ratio with 95%CI, and Binary logistic regression analysis were done to describe and assess associations among variables of interest. Results: Nearly all (97.3%) of respondents reported that they need health information to update themselves and support daily activities. More than half (54%) encountered problems on their daily activities due to information limitation. Major barriers to access information were geographical, organizational, personal, economic related, educational status and time. Only 145 (42.8%) respondents have access to internet at different places with various frequencies and have shown statistically significant association (p <0.05) with age, sex, monthly income, computer literacy and access, patient seen per day, working experience, and working site. Majority of study participants have too much limited access to different information resources,especially library and internet. More than half (57.7%) respondents seek information by consulting their hard copies when there is a need. About 151(44.5%) respondents prefer to access on job trainings and soft copies next to hardcopies. Conclusions and recommendations: Almost all respondents need to access health information and more than 80% of study areas have no library, internet and computer services. Therefore, great attentions and efforts must be done to help those starved health professionals working at those areas.
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    Assessment of Knowledge, Attitude and Utilization of Information Communication Technology among Medical students and Health care providers at Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital
    (Addis Ababa University, 2009-07) Adane, Melisachew; Lessa, Lemma(M.Sc); Shiferaw, Solomon(MD, MPH)
    Background: The advancement in Information Communication Technology (ICT) provides greater ease of access and use to exploit the benefits of computing for medical education as well as quality health service delivery. However, there is no adequate information on the level of knowledge and utilization patterns of ICT among medical students and health care providers in Ethiopia. Objective: To assess the knowledge, attitude and utilization of ICT among students and health care providers in AAU, Medical Faculty and Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital, Addis Ababa. Methods: A cross sectional survey was conducted in AAU, MF and Tikur Anbessa Specialized hospital from February to March 2009, a total of 403 study participants were randomly selected from undergraduates, residents and health care providers based on their population size proportionally. The quantitative data were collected using self administered pretested questionnaire. The study was complimented with in-depth interview. Data were initially entered into EPi-6 dos version and exported to SPSS version 15.0 for analysis. Result: A total of 334 students and 59 HCPs participated in the study and about 25% of the respondents had satisfactory knowledge. Around 52% of the respondents had at least one computer at home and 74.8% of study subjects had Internet access mostly from Internet café(46.6%). Among study participants who had Internet access, 89.3% were users though 90.1% of them using it for e-mail service. About 83.2% of study participants had positive attitude towards ICT. The utilization rate of computer was 32.6% for all respondents. Computer possession [OR(95%CI) = 5.67(2.68, 11.99)], having computer training [OR (95%CI) = 2.26(1.12, 4.55)], knowledge on ICT [OR (95%CI) = 2.52(1.31, 4.84)], being intern [OR (95%CI) =5.01(1.71,14.69)] and resident [OR (95%CI) = 6.84(1.46, 31.99)] had significant difference in level of utilization among students in Addis Ababa University, Medical Faculty. Conclusions and recommendations: The study indicated that students and HCPs had low knowledge level and poor utilization status of ICT for academic purpose and service delivery needs. The findings indicate the need for improving the existing ICT course in the curriculum to be more skill oriented and also formal in-service ICT related trainings for the health care providers. Further, it is recommended that the medical faculty as well as MOH should consider improving the ICT facilities for students and health care providers with the aim of achieving universal access.
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    Assessment of Utilization of Voluntary Counselingand Testing (VCT) Data for StrategicInformation in Addis Ababa
    (Addis Ababa University, 2009-05) Atnafu, Birhane; Deyessa, Nigussie (MD, MPH)
    BackgroundEvidence-based decision making in managing VCT services is imperative to strength the service.This ultimately roots in utilizing VCT data for strategic information.However, there has not beenprecise information pertaining to the VCTdata utilization for strategic information at healthcenter level.ObjectivesThestudywasconductedtoassessVCT data process performance, level ofutilizationand factorsaffectingits utilization in Addis Ababa city. MethodsFacility based cross-sectional study wasconducted from October, 2008 to May, 2009 in all 24health centers of Addis Ababa.A total of 134 health center employeesfrom all units/departmentsthat are involved in utilization VCT data were included in the study.Trained data collectorsadministered a pre-tested andstandardizedquestionnaire. In depth interviewwith keyinformants,oneVCT focal person from eachsub cityhealth desk,werealso conducted.Datawere enteredand cleaned using SPSS window version11.0. It was also employed for descriptive and logisticregression analysis.ResultsOverall, VCT data utilization rate was 22.4%. Data quality was good as data was reported withinreporting deadlines (89.6%), disaggregated (97.7%) and consistent (86.6%).Twenty three percentof healthcenter employeeswereable toanalyze VCTdata regularly.Health center employeeswho are older and those who analyze VCT data regularly were more likely to utilize VCT data forstrategic information,AOR (95%CI) =3.92(1.07, 13.26) andAOR (95%CI) =3.42(1.24-9.40),respectively. ConclusionLevel of VCT data utilizationis low at 22.4%.Process performance of VCT data in terms of dataquality wasgood;howeverin termsof data analysis was bad. Utilization was higher amongolderhealth professionalsand those who analyze VCT data regularly. RecommendationDue attention for data processing, in & on-service training on data processing with emphasis toutilization and involving young health personnel are recommended.
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    Architectural Framework for Information Integration: Case of Organizations Working on Water, Hygiene and Sanitation in Ethiopia
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-05) Mulualem, Wondwossen; Lamenew, Workshet ; Enquselassie, Fikre(Dr.)
    Water, Hygiene and Sanitation (WASH) is a subject of intersectoral interest that engages different governmental and non-governmental organizations. As it happens in the otherareas of public health, existence of parallel WASH activities makes the sector prone to theproblems of fragmentation, lack of consistency and other problems that plagued the sector. Such problems were felt at the national level by the Ethiopian government and, as the result,movement towards integrating all WASH activities in the nation was started by drafting aWASH implementation Framework (WIF) and Memorandum of Understanding whicheventually was signed by four governmental organizations. The WIF aims at integrating all aspects of WASH activities, including the information system, under one umbrella and the interest of this research lies on exploring the possibility for creating a framework for anintegrated WASH information system that can be shared by all stakeholders. The mainobjective of this research was to study the current status of WASH data creation,management and sharing practices among organizations working in the sector and proposean architectural framework that can be considered as a guide to setup an Integrated WASH information system. To this end, this research focused on the use of indicators as primary tools for data integration and attempted to study types of WASH activities performed and indicators used by target organizations, types of data they collect under each indicator,formats for data collection including the data attributes being used, standards being used for formulation of indicators and practice of sharing between organization working in the sector. Relevant data was collected mainly through semi-structured interviews and analysis of relevant documentations provided by the respondents. The result was eventually used to propose an architectural framework that can be considered as a starting point for practitioners working in the area. The framework was discussed with selected respondents for checking its validity and the overall reaction of the respondents was found to be positive.
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    Predicting the Pattern of Under-five Mortality in Ethiopia Using Data Mining Technology: The Case of Butajira Rural Health Program.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2012-06) Tekabe, Be’emnetu; Jemaneh, Getachew; Tefera, Worku
    Introduction:The under-five deaths in Ethiopiarepresent 48% of all mortality. More than halfof the under-five deaths occurred during the first year of life, and 53% of these before 2 monthsof age.Data miningis a collection of techniques for efficient automated discovery of previouslyunknown, valid, novel, useful and understandable patterns in large databases. Objective:The main objective of this study is to explore the potential applicability of datamining to predict the determinants, levels and pattern of under-five mortality in Ethiopia,particularly for the Butajira rural health program sites. This can greatly support for policymakers, planners, and healthcare providers working on the control of under-five childrenmortality in Ethiopia. Methods andMaterial:The methodology used for this research was a hybrid six-step CiosKnowledge Discovery Process. The required data was collected from Butajira rural healthprogramdatabase covering the period 1987-2008. The researcher used two popular data miningalgorithms (C4.5 J48 Decision Trees and Naïve Bayes Classifier) to develop the predictivemodel using a larger dataset (11,600 cases). The researcher also used a 10-fold cross validationand 90% split test mode fordataminingmethods of the two predictive models for performancecomparison purposes. Results:The results indicated that the decision tree (J48algorithm) is the best predictor withpruned parameter of the tree of 90% split test mode; it has 97.49% accuracy on the holdoutdataset (this predictive accuracy is better than any reported in the literature), Naïve BayesClassifier came out to be the second with supervised discretization has 96.67% accuracy. Conclusion:The results from this study were very capable and confirmed the belief thatapplyingdata mining techniques could indeed support a predictive model building task thatpredicts the pattern of under-five mortality in Ethiopia; particularly for Butajira rural healthprogramsitesarepossible. In the future, more classification studies by using a possible largeamount ofButajira rural health programdemographic and surveillance sitesdataset records withepidemiological information and employing other classification algorithms, tools and techniquescouldyield better results.
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    Application of Data Mining Techniques to Predict Urinary Fistula Surgical Repair Outcome: the Case of Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2012-06) Tefera, Minale; Jemaneh, Getachew; Mola, Mitike(Dr.)
    Background: The likelihood of the occurrence of incontinence after successful surgical repair makes predicting urinary fistula surgical repair outcome important for decision making during operation and for further follow up and treatment. Objective: The purpose of this thesis is to apply data mining techniques to build a model that can assist in predicting surgical outcome of urinary fistula repair based on clinical assessments done just before surgical repair. Methodology: The six-step hybrid knowledge discovery process model is used as a framework for the overall activities in the study. 15961 instances that have undergone urinary fistula repair in Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital are used for both predictive association rule extraction and predictive model building. Apriori algorithm is used to extract association rules while classification algorithms J48, PART, Naïve Bayes and multinomial logistic regression are used to build predictive models. Support and confidence are used as interestingness measure for association rules while area under the WROC and ROC curve for each specific outcome is sequentially used to compare performances of models from the predictive algorithms. Results: Predictive association rules from Apriori have shown frequent co-occurrence of less severity of injury with cured outcome. The predictive model from PART-M2-C0.05Q1 scheme has shown an area under WROC curve of 0.742. Area under the ROC curve for residual outcome(ROC=0.822) from this algorithm is better than Naïve Bayes and logistic, while the areas under the ROC curves for the other outcomes are greater than the model from J48. Conclusion: Predictive model is developed with the use of PART-M2-C0.05-Q1. It is Residual better in detecting residual outcome than the logistic regression model. The predictiveassociation rules and predictive model built with the use of data mining techniques can assist in predicting urinary fistula surgical repair outcome.
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    Need Assessment framework for Electronic health Record Management System in Ethiopia.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2012-06) Aklilu, Anteneh; Lamenew, Workeshet(PhD fellow); Enkuselassie, Fekre(Dr.)
    BACKGROUNDA standard in the field of Heath Informatics which has been taken for grantedup until this point may be disappearing and a new paradigm may begin to take shape as paper-based medical record (PMR) systems are changing to the electronic health record (EHR)systems. Although the PMR has played a critical role in recording patient’s clinical information,now many studies report that EHR systems improve quality of care beyond PMRs. For thisreason, the governments across the world have initiated various approaches accelerating EHRadoption. However, there have been a small number of studies explaining which factors affectEHR adoption and use in health institutions. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study is to investigate theactual practice of patient’s healthrecord handling throughout the health institutions in Ethiopia and see the gap between the paperbased medical record and electronic health record and developing architectural framework forelectronic health record. METHOD The necessary data is collected using questionnaire and interview within and aroundAddis Ababa to get the overall picture of the health data record handling of health institutions,like hospitals. RESULT The result of the study disclosed that almost all health institutions are exercising paperbased health record handling and extremely few institutions are using technological devices tohandle some part of their records, like patient registration, together with paper based patientmedical record which is highly subject to be misplaced, time taking and the like. CONCLUSION Architectural framework for electronic medical record is a must to have to allhealth service providers in all levels in order to improve their performance and to provide up tothe standard services to the community at large. The concerned management should provide thenecessary attention to it. All health institutions should be ready to implement technology basedfacility which is believed to be a must to have.
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    Predicting Tuberculosis Treatment Outcomes using Data Mining Technology.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-05) Kiflom, Samson; Mekonnen, Alemayhu(Dr.); Lamenew, Workshet
    Background: Tuberculosis is the second most common causes of death throughout the world next to HIV/AIDS. Ethiopia is also among the high burden countries. Though the disease has been a cause of death for millions of people around the globe, it is curable. Prediction of treatment outcome of TB patients using data mining techniques help the effort to stop TB-health problem. Objective: The objective of this research was to prepare a predictive model for TB treatment outcomes that assist clinical decisions in connection with TB treatment. Method: The six steps Ciso et al Hybrid Model were used. A total of 6332 instances were collected from five health centers of Addis Ababa City Government that provide tuberculosis treatment. A pre-processed the data was fed in to data mining tools with selected classification algorithms. These algorithms were J48, Naïve Bayes, SMO and PART. Accuracy and Area under ROC were the metrics used to compare models generated by the algorithms. Result: After successive experiments using the four algorithms, PART algorithm revealed best performance. An accuracy of 81.32% and area under ROC=0.89. The algorithm generated five rules for the three treatment outcomes and the rules were found to be interesting for experts. The rules contain the following predictor variables for treatment outcome: HIV Status, Sex, Age,Initial Weight with second month weight and Patient Category. Conclusion: The findings from the research indicated that for the tuberculosis dataset with class imbalance PART found to be the best learner algorithm and most importantly clinical decisions such as diagnosis, prognosis and resource allocation can be supported by data mining techniques.
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    Predicting Under Nutrition Status of Under-Five Children Using Data Mining Techniques; The Case of 2011 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-06) Markos, Zenebe; Yifiru, Martha(Dr.); Haidar, Jemal(Dr.)
    Background: under nutrition is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in children under the age of five in most developing countries including Ethiopia. Objective: The general objective of this study was to design a model that predicts the nutritional status of under-five children using data mining techniques. Methodology: This study followed hybrid methodology of Knowledge Discovery Process to achieve the goal of building predictive model using data mining techniques and used secondary data from 2011 Ethiopia Demographic and Health Survey dataset. Hybrid process model was selected since it combines best features of Cross-Industry Standard Process for Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery in Database methodology to identify and describe several explicit feedback loops which are helpful in attaining the research objectives. WEKA 3.6.8 data mining tools and techniques such as J48decision tree, Naïve Bayes and PART rule induction classifiers were utilized as means to address the research problem. Result: In this particular study, the predictive model developed using PART pruned rule induction found to be best performing having 92.6% of accurate results and 97.8% WROC area.Promising result has been achieved from the rules regarding nutritional status prediction. Conclusion: The results from this study were encouraging and confirmed that applying data mining techniques could indeed support a predictive model building task that predicts nutritional status of under-five children in Ethiopia. In the future, integrating large demographic and health survey dataset and clinical dataset, employing other classification algorithms, tools and techniques could yield better results.
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    Constructing a Predictive Model for Occurrence of Tuberculosis: The Case of Menelik II Hospital and St. Peters TB Specialized Hospital.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-05) Mulugeta, Teketel; Yifru, Martha(PhD); Betre, Mulugeta (MD, MPH)
    ABSTRACT Background: Tuberculosis is a disease of poverty affecting mostly young adults in their most productive years. In Ethiopia, TB is a disease of major public health problem. Early identification and isolation of TB cases is critical to prevent further transmission, morbidity and mortality caused by TB. Data mining has a potential to indentify hidden knowledge from huge datasets. It is possible to use data mining algorithms for analysis and predicting the TB status ofpatients. Objective: The goal of this research was to apply data mining techniques for predicting the TB status of patients. Specifically, identify the determinant attributes of TB status of patients, build best prediction model and finally develop a prototype graphical user interface. Methodology: A hybrid data mining process model that involved six steps is followed. This study considers a total of 10,031 records from Menelik II and St. Peters TB specialized hospitals patients’ data and 15 attributes for predicting the TB status. Descriptive data analysis,visualization and statistical summary were implemented to gain understanding of the data. Handling of missing values and data transformation were done to prepare the dataset for experimentation. The mining algorithms used are decision tree, naïve bayes, support vector machine and artificial neural network. To evaluate the models performance 10-fold cross validation and confusion matrix are used. Results: The result of the experiments with all and selected attributes showed that performance of J48, Sequential minimal optimization and Multilayer perceptron were better with all attributes than best selected attributes, whereas naïve bayes classifier performance increased with selected attributes than all attributes. The results of the experiments show the performance of mining algorithms decreases as the amount of training increases. The best selected model to predict the TB status of patients in this study was generated by J48 decision tree with all attributes. The accuracy of this model is 95.24%. Graphical user interface prototype was designed using the ten rules from J48 decision tree. Conclusion: The results achieved from this research indicate that data mining is useful in bringing relevant information from large and complex patients’ dataset, and we can use this information for predicting TB status and decision making. The most important attributes that determine the TB status of the patients are shortness of breath, chest pain, cough, weight loss,loss of appetite, night sweats and HIV test results.
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    Utilization of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for Accessing Health Information by Physicians in Addis Ababa Private Hospitals
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-10) Kibru, Sahle; Addissie, Adamu(MD, MPH); Kebede, Gashaw (PhD)
    Background: Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are defined as digital and analogue technologies that facilitate the capturing, processing, storage and exchange of information via electronic communication. ICTs have the potential to improve information management, access to health services, quality of care, continuity of services, and cost containment. So that, the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) within healthcare can makes significant changes in the daily operations of hospitals. Objective: These were to: identify the available ICTs tools and services to the physicians; identify the purposes of ICTs utilization by the physicians in private hospitals; determine the extent to which the existing information services meet information needs of the physicians;assess the factors to access and utilize of ICTs by the physicians; and explore the knowledge and attitudes of the physicians to utilize ICTs for their work. Methodology: A cross-sectional survey of 147 physicians in private hospitals in Addis Ababa was conducted to gather the availability and utilization of ICTs for accessing health information to their daily clinical activities. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 16.0, and summery measures, descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis were used for interpreting and presentation the data. Important Findings: The survey revealed that physicians 34.7% had own Smart phones, 87 have flush disk for their work , only forty-nine(33.8%) physicians survey reported that they have computer available in the hospitals accessed for their works, among those thirty-three (22.4%)physicians reported that they have internet connection in the hospitals. In terms of knowledge and attitudes 74% of physicians had satisfactory knowledge ICTs utilization and 71% of physicians‟ also favorable attitudes towards ICTs for their daily activities. The study also predicted the relation between the outcome variable and the possible factors. Physicians‟ activity,working experience, computer access and computer training are found to have significant effect on ICTs utilization. Similarly, physicians‟ level of specialty, computer accessibility, working burden and taking forma computer training found to have significant effects among possible factors on physicians attitude towards ICTs utilization for daily operations. Conclusion: Information has been critical part of the medical professionals‟ /physicians/armament of tools to provide patient care. Utilizing ICTs can offer the physicians with enhanced access to: key data at all levels from international to local, electronic libraries of evidence, peer reviewed research and practice guidelines, and network of professionals in health and related disciplines. While information access is critical in delivery of quality health care services, there are many problems that are inherent in attempting to meet the information needs of physicians at private Hospitals.
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    Factors Affecting the Adoption of Health Management Information Systems (HMIS) Among Health Workers: The Case of SmartCare Software in Addis Ababa Regional Public Hospitals
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-06) Dereje Teshager; Teferi, Dereje (Dr.); Seme, Assefa (Dr.)
    Background: There has been an increasing interest in the area of Electronic Medical Records (EMR) and more and more hospitals all over the world try to keep their patients’ records electronically. The adoption of EMR has become a major concern in the healthcare industry, as it is a key factor to the healthcare quality improvement. In Ethiopia, the implementation of Electronic Medical Record (EMR) is through software called SmartCare. SmartCare software possesses numerous advantages and features such as Simultaneous, remote access to patient data, Legibility of record, Safer data,Patient data confidentiality, greater range of data output modalities and Service Integration within the facility (laboratory, pharmacy, prescription & scheduling). However, these systems are not used by the health workers in Addis Ababa Regional Public hospitals. Objective: The objective of this study was to identify and measure the factors affecting the behavioral intention and usage behavior of health workers EMR-SmartCare Software adoption in public Hospitals of Addis Ababa City Administration. Methodology: To identify the factors affecting the utilization of EMR-SmartCare software, a cross-sectional descriptive study which was quantitative were employed and a total of 303 study participants were randomly selected from health workers based on their population size proportionally in selected 5 regional hospitals of city administration using Selfadministered questionnaires. Results: The findings provide strong empirical support for all of the main constructs mentioned in the research model,which posits five direct determinants of intention to use EMR-SmartCare software and another two direct determinants of actual Use Behavior as follow: Performance Expectancy(PE), Effort Expectancy(EE), Social Influence (SI), ComputerAttitude(CA), Personal Innovativeness in IT(PIIT) as determinant of Behavioral Intention and; Facilitating Conditions(FC) and Behavioral Intention(BI) as determinants of Actual Usage Behavior(AUB). These results maintain enough explanatory power R2 =.702 (Adjusted R squared=.333) to help explain the intentions and actual use behavior of health workers in adopting EMR- SmartCare software. Conclusion: These research findings indicate that the variables in the proposed research model significantly and positively impact the behavioral intention and actual use behavior to adopt EMR-SmartCare software. Among these,attitude towards computers has the most significant positive impact on adoption intentions. Therefore this study suggests that in order to enhance the intention to adopt and use EMR-SmartCare software, hospitals should strengthen independent impact variables, including Attitude towards Computers, Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence,Facilitating Conditions and Personal Innovativeness in IT. In view of the fact that the achieved conceptual framework considers the particular characteristics of the health workers, contributions and implications of this study are significant both at the theoretical level as well as the practical level. This study not only provided some interesting findings and suggestions for practice but also produced a paradigm for scholars who are interested in the behavior of technology adoption for health care sectors.
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    Online Information Seeking Behavior of Health professionals: the Case of Private and Public Hospitals in Addis Ababa
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-06) Desta, Degale; Bekele, Rahel(PhD); Zergaw, Ababi (PhD)
    Background: Online information has become a ubiquitous part of health information lives, so that most health professionals have access to and are comfortable with using it to look for online healthcare provision and decision making. Objective: To identify the behavior of online information use of health professionals for provision of health care. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in seven selected hospitals in Addis Ababa,Ethiopia using both quantitative and qualitative methods by using self-administered survey questionnaire. Data were analyzed using correlation and multiple regression statistical procedures. Results: The results of this study has shown that ease of information seeking, feeling empowered, self-health management and support from the online community has been powerful motivators. Predictive association in healthcare provision using multiple linear regression coefficients, when access to online health information increases by 0.039, 0.028 and 0.025 units for 1 unit increase in the scales of empowerment, online social networking and cognitive involvement with related health information respectively, and decreases by 0.007 units for 1 unit increases in the scale of age. Likewise, Predictive association in healthcare provision using multiple linear regression coefficients retained positively correlated with access to online health information and ease of information seeking, getting preventive healthcare tests, self-healthcare management & privacy and positive outcomes related to networking and learning with increasing rate of (0.182, 0.346, 0.021 and 0.495) respectively. Conclusion: Health information from online sources is a significant component of health professionals‘ self-healthcare provision plan and initiates collaboration of professionals work in overall health care dissemination and retrieval information. However, health professionals expressed strong desire to use internet sources, the study has identified a number of barriers to use internet.
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    Predicting Maternal Health Care Seeking Pattern Using Data Mining Techniques in Ethiopia.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-06) Ayele, Dawit; Jemaneh, Getachew; Mekonnen, Wubegzier (PhD)
    Background: Utilization of maternal health care services could save unnecessary severe complications and death among women during pregnancy, delivery and after delivery. Ethiopia is one of the countries with high maternal morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa which needs more public health care effort in the country. Objective: The general objective of the study was to construct a model that can predict the maternal health care seeking pattern of reproductive age in Ethiopia. Methodology: The study followed Hybrid methodology of Knowledge Discovery Process to achieve the goal of building predictive model using data mining techniques. Therefore, the overall research design was to build a model that can predict the maternal health care seeking pattern using J48 Decision tree and Naïve Bayes algorithms in Ethiopia from EDHS 2011 dataset. WEKA 3.6.8 data mining tools and techniques were employed as a means to address the research problem. Results: The result of the study showed that the J48 Decision tree algorithm outperforms Naïve Bayes on the three of the outcome variables. For antenatal care the model was selected with an accuracy of 74.78%. Then for the second outcome variable (delivery care) the model was selected with an accuracy of 91.23% and area under receiver operating characteristics of 0.89. Finally for postnatal care the model was selected with an accuracy of 87.5% and area under receiver operating characteristics curve of 0.80. The best attributes selected for each of the outcome variables are Place of Residence, Household Wealth Index, Women’s Educational level, Husbands Occupation, Region, Husbands Educational level, Total number of children, Media Exposure. Conclusion: In general, the results obtained from this study were interesting and encouraging; it can be used as decision support for healthcare practitioner. The finding shows that there is a regional difference in utilizing maternal health care service in the country, thus it is recommended that all the concerned parties should give due consideration for these regions, increasing maternal education at least up to primary level in all regions of the country, provision of opportunities for employment and poverty reduction especially in rural parts of the region.
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    Health information seeking behavior among health professionals working at Addis Ababa health bureau Hospitals.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2013-06) Aymiro, Belachew; Adisse, Mesfine (MD, MPH); Teferi, Dereje (PhD)
    Background: Health information plays a significant role in the quality of decisions made by health professionals while delivering health services. Utilization of information among health professionals differs as a result of individual health information seeking behavior. Researches showed that individual, organizational and infrastructure factors affect the health information seeking behavior. Objective: To assess health information seeking behavior of health professionals working in Addis Ababa health bureau owned hospitals. Methods: - A cross-sectional survey using qualitative and quantitative methods was used to assess health information seeking behavior of health professionals working in six hospitals. Self administered questionnaire was used to collect data from 422 respondents and observational check list was used to collect qualitative data. The collected data was analyzed using EPI INFO version 3.5.1 software and using SPSS statistics version 16 after the data was exported from the EPI INFO software and interprets by using the following parameters: frequencies cross tabulation, binary logistic regression and Odds Ratio (OR). Significant association among study variables and interpretation of data were done by using 95% CI and at p-value<0.05. Results: Only 339(82.7%) have a characteristics of seeking health information from different sources and places with various frequencies. Majority of the respondents 378(92.2%) have a need to have further on-job training to support their work. The most frequent used information source in almost all study area was medical text books 334(81.5%) but the most preferred HIRsby respondents are on job training 202(49.3%) and electronics and internet 188(45.9%).Economy, time, organizational infrastructure, low disease prevalence and personal initiation are the most common factors in seeking of health information. Conclusion and recommendation: Majority of respondents has a behavior of seeking health information and most of them accessed printed resources but they prefer electronic materials and discuss with colleagues to solve their information limitation related to health. So all concerned body must give attention to these and must work in information sharing by using consultationand morning session methods.
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    Adoption of Electronic Medical Records among Health Professionals at Public Hospitals in Addis Ababa City Administration Health Bureau, Ethiopia.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2012-12) Gebremariam, Semere; Lamenew, Workshet(MSc); Deyassa, Negussie(PhD)
    INTRODUCTION:Wellness and health are central to live of all people of age group. Incorporating information communication like Electronic Medical Records on the health care industries is mandatory for the better improvement of patient care and safety, integrated research, for effective planning,monitoring and evaluation of disease etc. Electronic Medical Record implementation in public hospitals in Addis Ababa is on the infant stage not more than three years since its inception.Even though There is discrepancy in adoption among health professionals and is not utilized as needed due to different factors,most of the public hospitals have implemented it.So identifying the factors which affect the adoptionwill help to apply proactive measure and correction so as to increase the adoption of EMR among health professionals whom are working at the public hospitals. OBJECTIVE:This study aimed at identifying the factors that affect the Behavioral Intention and usage behavior of Electronic Medical Record and determine the utilization status among health professionals working in public hospital in Addis Ababa City Administration health Bureau. METHOD: A Cross-sectional survey was carried out among health professionals working at public hospitals in Addis Ababa using modified theory of unified acceptance and use of technology(UTAUT)model. Four hundred eight health professionals who had training on EMR were interviewed at the five public hospitals. RESULTS:The utilization of EMR among health professions working at the public hospitals was 51.7%permanence expectancy, Effort expectancy, social influence were factors influencing the behavioral intention of health professionals to adopt EMR and Behavioral intention was also significant influencing factor on actual usage behavior. Facilitating condition remains insignificant on the actual usage behavior of EMR among health professionals. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION:The utilization rate of EMR was 51.7%: Having no experience,misunderstanding on the relative advantage, perceiving complexity of the system, inadequate support of the top managers, low behavioral intent were factors associated with the behavioral intention and actual usage of EMR. This study indicates that the necessity of integrating health management information system with the daily health care activities and development of health information policy that can scale the utilization rate.
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    Mobile based Emergency Reporting System for Infectious Disease Surveillance.
    (Addis Ababa University, 2015-06) Ahmed, Harif; Bekele, Rahel(Dr.)
    Quick detection and response to emergency infectious disease is crucial.However ,manual paper based reporting and reporting system has many shortcomings such as inability to report emergency infectious disease on time and the possibility of errors that can be committed during data entry. The research project therefor ,aimed to design mobile based emergency reporting for infectious disease Surveillance report system for Oromia regional health bureau in order to improve the use of mobile based reporting for infectious disease Surveillance for making sound detection and alert response to prevent and to control communicable diseases.
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    Relationship Between Nutritional Status and mental Development of Children in Elka Na Mataramofa, East Showa
    (Addis Ababa University, 1996-05) Mogga, Souci; Alemu, Tadesse (PhD)
    Malnutrition is one of the major problem in the world particularly in developing countries and it is endem ic in Eth iopia. Different studies have showed that severe malnutri tion during in fancy negatively affects mental development. Most malnu tri tion begins in the second year of life, and most of it is chronic and mild to moderate in severity. This is why the current study is looking at even mildly malnourished children I - 4 years of age. To assess the mental development of children in relation to their nutr itional status, I II children 12 - 42 months of age from a single peasant association were taken in this study. From these chi ldren 49.5 % were under weight, 52.2% were stunted and 9.9% were wasted. The mean Bayley score was 88 and SO 13. Most (71.2%) scored 76 - 101. The mean Bayley score between those stunted and non-stunted showed a significant difference. Multiple linear regression also showed HI A significantly related to mental development. In addition to nutritional status, birth order and delivery events were shown to have strong relation to mental development. Therefore we recommend an extensive health education on nutrition, expansion of delivery services to the rural population and further research on mental development of children with emphasis on the effect of family interaction and chIld rearing pracfice on mental development.
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    The Incidence of Injuries and Their Determinants in Akaki Textile Factory A. A. Region
    (Addis Ababa University, 1991-03) Senbeto, Elias; W, George. (PhD)
    A descriptive and case control study was done to observe the incidence of injuries and their determinants in Akaki textile factory. There were a total of 143 accidents during the study period giving an incidence density of 200 per 1000 person years. This is very high in comparison to developed countries. The most frequent cause of injury was machinery (29.4%), and hit by/against objects (20 . 3%) . Most of the accidents occurred in the Weaving department (109.2 per 1000 exposed workers). From our study , we found out that most accidents occurred on Mondays {35. 7%) and on Fridays(17.5%). The most common time of accidents was from 8am to lOam . The most common parts of the body which were affected by accidents were finger (42%), lower leg(18.9%), hand (13.3%). The most frequent type of accidents were prick (32.9%), laceration (30.8%), and bruise (16.8%). From the result of our study, 87.4% of the interviewed workers were not wearing personal protective devices and 86.1% had not taken safety training. 1001 total man days was lost due to 143 accidents over a period of 12 weeks. More injuries occurred in those workers who were below the age of 30 years as compared to those above 30 year (p <.05), and more injuries occurred in those workers who were above 6lli grade (p<.05). Recommendations in how to reduce the rate of accidents are made.
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    Prevalence of menstrual irregularity and associated factors among preparatory school girls in Adama Town, Oromia Region, Ethiopia.
    (Addis Abeba University, 2021-08) Negesso, Kemer; Deressa, Wakgari(PhD); Ayele, Wondimu(MSc, PhD Fellow)
    Background:Menstrual irregularity is a common gynecological problem among reproductive age women affecting not only their social activities and school attendance but also families,social and national economy as well. This problem for female students in developing countries who may face life-threatening condition is considered as minor health concern. Inconsistent andinconclusive findings on menstrual irregularity and its associated factors were indicated. Moreover, data on magnitude and factors associated with menstrual irregularity is scarce in Ethiopia. Objectives:The aim of this study was to assess prevalence of menstrual irregularity and associated factors among preparatory school girls. Methods:Institution-based, cross-sectional study was conducted among 367 female students in five selected schools from Nov. 20 to Dec.10, 2020, in Adama Town of Oromia Regional State in Ethiopia. Stratified random sampling technique was used to select study participant from both public and private schools. Data were collected using a pre-tested, structured self-administered questionnaire. Data were entered and analysed using SPSS version 25. Descriptive analysis was performed using frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation. Chi-square test was used to determine the relationship between menstrual irregularity and categorical variables. Furthermore multivariable binary logistic regression was used to test the presence of association between Menstrual irregularity and all other independent variables like age at menarche, stress,BMI and sleep duration. Statistical significance was considered at P<0.05. Results:The age of respondents ranges from 15 to 22 years with a mean and standard deviation of 18.18 ± 1.44. The average age (SD) at menarche was 13.16 ± 1.42. The prevalence of menstrual irregularity was 26.5% with 95% CI of (21.9%, 31.5%). Statistically significant association was observed between outcome variable (menstrual irregularity) and categorical explanatory variables, such as: BMI, in both teenager and young adult students, (X df = 3=19.73, p<0.001 and X2 df= 3= 8.5, p<0.05) respectively, ge at menarche, (X df = 2 = 11.9, p<0.05), sleep duration, (X2 df = 2 = 15.2, p<0.001), and stress (X22 df = 3 = 29.5, p<0.001). 2The most important factors statistically significantly associated with menstrual irregularity include, school type (AOR=2.01, 95%CI: 1.03,3.94), educational status of mother (primary education (AOR=0.14, 95%CI: 0.05,0.39) & secondary education (AOR=0.37, 95%CI: 0.14,0.99), early age at menarche (AOR=1.95, 95%CI: 1.03,3.69), short period (AOR=3.34,95%CI: 1.56,7.16), long period (AOR=4.23, 95%CI: 1.48,12.03), scanty period (AOR=0.35, 95%CI: 0.18,0.65), sleeping <7hr (AOR=2.18, 95%CI: 1.14,4.18), and stress (moderate stress, AOR=4.1, 95%CI: 1.64,10.04), severe/extremely severe stress (AOR=4.62, 95%CI: 1.57,13.56). Conclusion:The prevalence of menstrual irregularity among preparatory school girls in Adama Town was found to be high compared with studies conducted in different parts of theworld. Menstrual irregularity was more common with private school students, early age at menarche, short and long duration of menstrual flow, sleeping less tha seven hour per day, having moderate, severe or extremely severe level of stress and being overweight or obesed. Whereas having mother followed primary and secondary level of education and having scanty amount of menstrual flow were found to be protective factors for the occurrence of menstrual irregularity. Recommendation:It should be recommended to create awareness and provide heath education to the students regarding mensturation, what regular and irregular menstrual cycle means and the factors that leads to menstrual irregularity.