Matrix for selecting the best mobile-based system for public health surveillance

Background: Effective public health decision making during public health emergencies or mass gatherings requires timely and accurate information from a variety of sources. Mobile-based systems (e.g., smart phones) for data collection, transmission, reporting, and analyses provide a faster, easier, and cheaper means to communicate standardized and shareable public health data for decision making. There is a need for a Matrix or comparative review of parameters like cost, training required, and travel because selecting the appropriate software remains a challenge.

Objective/Purpose: We developed a Matrix tool that assists health professionals in the selection of the appropriate software for standing up mobile-based public health surveillance.

Methods: We constructed the Matrix with four categories (technology, features, human capacity, and cost) and several attributes. We then performed an environmental scan to identify available commercial, open-source, or government sponsored software. Finally, we compared and categorized each software based on these attributes.

Results: Ten software programs were identified, and we made recommendations from our analyses of the attributes for each. This Matrix was then used to select a software program for a mobile-based infectious disease surveillance system used during the 2009 Hajj in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and during the recent Haiti earthquake public health relief effort.

Conclusions: Mobile computing technology can provide a rapid and accurate data flow for public health decision-making during mass gatherings or public health emergencies. The Matrix developed here provided technical, human capacity and other software selection factors for the successful development and deployment of mobile-based public health surveillance.