Provincial Maternal and Child Information System in Inner Mongolia, China: Descriptive Implementation Study

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Public Health
• Reproductive Health

Background:

• China's 2- and 3-child policies increased high-age and high-risk pregnancies, straining maternal and child health (MCH) services.
• Large-scale information systems are crucial for managing MCH in populous, mobile nations.
• Provincial MCH information systems were lacking in lower-income regions, a gap addressed by Inner Mongolia's RMCIS in 2020.

Purpose of the Study:

• To detail the construction of a regional maternal and child information system (RMCIS).
• To evaluate the RMCIS's effectiveness in enhancing regional maternal and child health (MCH) in Inner Mongolia.

Main Methods:

• A descriptive study was conducted on the RMCIS implementation in Inner Mongolia.
• The system architecture comprised 10 modules for diverse MCH services, utilizing a five-color management approach for pregnancy risk stratification.
• Data on construction costs, patient demographics, and service utilization were collected from January 2020 to October 2022 for descriptive analysis.

Main Results:

• The RMCIS construction cost CNY 8 million (US $1.1 million) and took 13 months.
• From 2020-2022, the system registered 221,772 pregnant women and 147,264 newborns across 278 hospitals and 225 community health centers.
• High-risk pregnancies (yellow, orange, red, purple) identified factors like scarred uterus (36.58%), BMI≥28 (38.67%), aggressive placenta praevia (20.51%), and viral hepatitis (45.96%).

Conclusions:

• The RMCIS successfully achieved provincial MCH data interconnection for essential services.
• The system yielded significant social and economic benefits.
• The Inner Mongolia RMCIS implementation offers valuable insights for global medical administration, practitioners, and informatics developers.