Source: Health Policy and Planning, Volume 16, Number 4, December 2001 , pp. 444-444(1)

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Abstract:

The Household Registration System (HRS) is a software package designed to facilitate the development of data management systems for longitudinal health research. Such research generally requires complex computing systems to manage and maintain the integrity of longitudinal, multi-level data. These systems can be prohibitively expensive to develop de novo, particularly in the developing world where the need for health research is critical but computing expertise is scarce.

The HRS contains a core template that provides data entry screens, manages demographic surveillance data, prints error reports, and provides standard demographic output. This core can be customized to the needs of individual projects using menu- and mouse-driven procedures. Data tables, data entry screens, and consistency logic can be added to graft additional modules onto the core system, such as birth weight, morbidity episodes, or household possessions. The HRS is written in Microsoft Visual FoxPro for Windows and takes advantage of object-oriented, visual programming techniques to facilitate the customization process, greatly reducing the need for extensive on-site technical expertise. The HRS is also well adapted to remote technical assistance: a programmer can develop a form or data entry screen remotely, which can be emailed to the research site and dropped into the customized HRS.

The HRS was developed by the Population Council and the University of Southern Maine with funding from the Thrasher Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. It was initially fielded at the Navrongo Health Research Centre in Ghana, and is currently in use in 11 longitudinal health research stations in Africa and Asia. The HRS can be downloaded free of charge at [http://www.popcouncil.org/hrs/hrs.html]. A paper describing the HRS in greater detail can be viewed at [http://www.demographic-research.org/Volumes/Vol2/6/default.htm]. More information about sites using the HRS can be found on the website of INDEPTH [http://www.indepth-network.org], a network of sites conducting longitudinal health research in the developing world.

For more information, contact Dr Bruce MacLeod [macleod@usm.maine.edu] and Dr James F Phillips (Email: jphillips@popcouncil.org).

Document Type: Research article

Publication date: 2001-12-01

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• Health Policy and Planning blends such individual specialities as epidemiology, health and development economics, management and social policy, planning and social anthropology into a lively academic mix that constantly stimulates and keeps readers abreast of modern international health care.

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