DoH improves COVID-19 dashboards to allow real-time monitoring

The Department of Health (DoH) recently upgraded its coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) dashboards in order to provide local government units and health facilities with timely information on bed capacity and service availability, COVID-19 commodities and supplies, and vaccine administration.

“The dramatic surge of COVID-19 cases pushed DoH’s old system to its limits requiring quick reengineering to record and process real-time data from the different health facilities and vaccination sites throughout the Philippines,” said Dr. Enrique A. Tayag, director of DoH’s Knowledge Management and Information Technology Service, in a statement.

The agency enlisted the help of Info Alchemy Corporation and Microsoft to improve the Data Collect (DDC) system, which is now able to provide comprehensive COVID-19-related data in real-time. The new system uses Microsoft Power BI, a cloud-based business analytics solution that allows users to publish and customize interactive reports and analyze and visualize data.

“Making vaccines available to as many Filipinos as possible is a critical agenda for us, both as an organization and as a partner to the national government’s efforts to do the same,” said Joanna V. Rodriguez, public sector director of Microsoft Philippines. “We’re committed to doing everything we can to drive the country towards resilience and economic recovery together with our state agencies and local governments.”

The upgraded internal dashboards should give DoH an advantage in decision-making.