IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF ROUTINE DATA

Hospital Management Teams are expected to make crucial decisions in theshort, medium and long term often based on questionable data. The integrityof decision-making is hence compromised by poor quality information. Thisreport examines the interventions at a Public Hospital (GJ Crooke’s Hospital)to improve the quality of routine health data by focusing on systems, staffcapacity and organisational culture.The methodology used was largely a qualitative approach together withsimple elements of a quantitative approach in order to collect the required indepthinformation from targeted informants. Document reviews andobservations augmented the information collected.The study shows that, at GJ Crooke’s Hospital, strong organisationalinformation culture plays a major role in improving data quality, whilst partiallyintegrated systems are detrimental to the quality of data. Focussed capacitybuilding and the development, implementation and monitoring of a DataManagement Policy will contribute further to enhancing data quality at theHospital.