Assessing Ghana's eHealth workforce: implications for planning and training

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Health Services Research
• Workforce Development

Background:

• eHealth, the application of information and communication technology in healthcare, is crucial for addressing quality and accessibility issues.
• Low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) could greatly benefit from eHealth, but a shortage of skilled personnel to develop and maintain these systems is a major obstacle.
• There is limited understanding of the current and ideal eHealth workforce requirements in LMICs.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a framework for characterizing and assessing the eHealth workforce in hospitals within LMICs.
• To evaluate the sufficiency of the eHealth workforce in selected hospitals in Ghana using the developed framework.

Main Methods:

• Development of a general framework to categorize the eHealth workforce in LMIC settings.
• Combination of qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and quantitative data from the Workload Indicator of Staffing Needs (WISN) tool.
• Assessment conducted in three hospitals in Ghana, surveying 76 eHealth staff members.

Main Results:

• Two primary eHealth cadres were identified: technical support/information technology (IT) and health information management (HIM).
• The IT cadre was predominantly trained in Science and Engineering, with most staff holding at least a bachelor's degree.
• The WISN assessment indicated that all surveyed sites had insufficient eHealth workforces, with IT staff capacity at 10% in two hospitals and 42% short in another.

Conclusions:

• A framework for characterizing and assessing the eHealth workforce in LMICs has been successfully developed.
• The study provides a quantitative understanding of eHealth staffing needs in LMICs, crucial for human capital development.
• Findings can guide educators in refining curricula and assist other LMICs in evaluating the impact of a skilled eHealth workforce on return on investment.