Nurse Olive Iragena used to think that nursing was just about caring for patients. But since 2010, she has been supporting the health facility in data management as well. The health facility has created a “data room” for nurses and other health facility team members to easily view data and regularly use it for quick analysis and improving the quality of health services.
“We have good results from the creation of the data room,” says Nurse Iragena, who works at Kirwa HC, Ngoma District, Rwanda. “Now the nurses and all health facility team members are more familiar with data than before, and all decisions made at the health facility level are based on health center data.”
In celebration of 2020, the International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife, Nurse Iragena calls upon all health worker teams to be involved in data management, because it helps them identify gaps and where to improve. Nurses should not be assigned only to patient care—they can also manage health data.
Under the USAID Ingobyi Activity, Nurse Iragena and others in 20 project-supported districts receive coaching, mentorship, and supportive supervision to improve data quality assurance and data use in health facilities.
cc: Rwanda Health | USAID Global Health
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