BACKGROUND
Maternal mortality remains a persistent public health concern in Sub-Saharan African countries such as Ethiopia. Previous research has shown that when healthcare facilities do not have the necessary supplies to provide basic emergency obstetric care (BEmOC), women experiencing these emergencies can receive delayed diagnosis/treatment or suboptimal care. Health information technology solutions are a flexible and low-cost method for tracking medical supply availability. Furthermore, these solutions can lead to improved health outcomes, and have displayed proven benefits in low-to-middle income country health systems.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to develop and evaluate the usability of electronic dashboards to monitor facility-level readiness to manage basic emergency obstetric care (BEmOC) in Amhara, Ethiopia.
METHODS
The study used three methods to iteratively refine the dashboards: (1) user-centered design sessions with individuals who interact with the BEmOC supply chain; (2) review and feedback from domain and information visualization subject matter experts (SMEs) to refine the dashboards; and (3) usability heuristic evaluations from human-computer interaction (HCI) SMEs.
RESULTS
User-centered design sessions resulted in a preliminary version of the dashboards informed by end-user preferences and perceptions. Next, domain and visualization SMEs continued the dashboards’ iterative refinement, by confirming design choices and recommending changes to enhance the dashboards’ navigation. HCI SMEs rated the dashboards as highly usable (0.82 on a scale of 0-4).
CONCLUSIONS
Dashboards are a novel method for promoting and tracking a facility’s capacity to manage BEmOC. By including targeted end-users and experts in the design process the team was able to tailor the dashboards to meet user needs, fit into the existing government health systems, and ensure that the dashboards follow design best practices. Collectively, the novel, customized BEmOC dashboards can be used to track and improve facility readiness in Amhara, Ethiopia, and similar global BEmOC facilities.