iHRIS Qualify

iHRIS Qualify enables professional councils and associations to maintain a database of registered and licensed health professionals to support increased quality of care.

iHRIS Qualify enables a licensing or certification authority, such as a nursing council, to track complete data on a health worker cadre from pre-service training through attrition. It captures information about health professionals in that cadre from the time they enter pre-service training through registration, certification, and/or licensure. Since separate councils usually regulate doctors, dentists, pharmacists, and allied health professionals, each council can maintain its own iHRIS Qualify system, and data can be aggregated to provide a complete picture of a country’s entire regulated health workforce. iHRIS Qualify can also track employment, continuing education credits, and out-migration requests for workers in the cadre.

Background

Professional health councils play a key role in ensuring national health workforce quality by credentialing health professionals through licensure, registration, and certification. Information gathered and generated by these councils is crucial for countries to address health worker shortages and meet growing health-care demands. Unfortunately, many councils store this information in paper files or electronic databases that do not link together, making it difficult to supply aggregate information.

A computerized and integrated human resources information system (HRIS) enables countries to more easily collect, maintain, and analyze health workforce data. The global iHRIS community’s free and open source iHRIS solutions supply health-sector leaders with information they need to track, manage, and plan the health workforce.

iHRIS Qualify is a health professional registration, licensing, and certification application. Using iHRIS Qualify, a nursing council, for example, can collect, track, and analyze data on all nurses in the country. Each separate council that regulates doctors, dentists, pharmacists, and allied health professionals can maintain its own iHRIS Qualify system, and data from all systems can be aggregated to provide a picture of a country’s entire regulated health workforce. This open source software is free and can be customized to meet the specific needs of a council or country.

Benefits

iHRIS Qualify enables a professional health council to record data on a cadre of health workers from the time they enter pre-service training through registration and licensure. It can also track deployments, issue licenses for private practice, and record out-migration verification requests. Thus, it can provide complete information about that cadre, whether they are in training, employed in the public or private sector, or even working outside the health sector. Once installed, iHRIS Qualify can easily be modified to meet the specific requirements of the health council.

Data captured by iHRIS Qualify helps a professional health council to:

  • Enforce minimum qualifications for students entering training programs
  • Administer national-level examinations that qualify a graduating student to practice within the country
  • Verify that continuing education requirements have been completed before renewing licenses
  • Issue private practice licenses to qualified health professionals
  • Verify qualifications of foreign-trained health workers applying to work within the country and internal health workers applying to work in foreign countries.

 

Features

  • Records management: Record information about each health worker, such as citizenship, marital status, birth date, contact information, educational qualifications, and identification numbers.
  • Pre-service training tracking: Track students entering pre-service training programs and monitor completion rates as well as reasons for training disruption.
  • Examination management: Record applications for national-level certification examinations and track exam results.
  • Registration and licensing: Issue registration numbers, licenses, and license renewals for health professionals; track deployments; issue private practice licenses; and manage out-migration verification requests.
  • Reporting: Aggregate, analyze, and export data in a variety of ways to answer key policy and management questions.
  • Interoperability: iHRIS easily links with DHIS2OpenMRS, and other popular global-health technologies.
  • Technical support: global community of iHRIS developers and users provides support via an email group, an interactive website, and an online documentation library.

The following features ensure security and accuracy of data stored in the system:

  • Error checking and data correction by authorized data managers to ensure data integrity
  • Automated logging of the username, date, and time when data are entered or changed
  • Permanent archiving of all data changes to ensure a consistent record of each health professional’s work history.

Country Examples

Registrars of professional health councils in Nigeria and Uganda have opted to use iHRIS Qualify and have modified it to meet their councils’ specific needs.