About HIFA2015
The HIFA2015 campaign was launched in Mombasa, Kenya in October 2006, at the 10th Congress of the Association for Health Information and Libraries in Africa. Our shared goal is: By 2015, every person worldwide will have access to an informed healthcare provider. People will no longer be dying for lack of knowledge.
Why HIFA2015 is needed?
“Bridging the know-do gap is the foremost challenge and opportunity for public health in the 21st century”
Ariel Pablos-Mendez, Managing Director, Rockefeller Foundation
There is an urgent need to improve the availability and use of healthcare information in developing countries. In 2004 the World Health Organization commissioned a review of the issues, and a short version of this was published in The Lancet by Fiona Godlee et al, under the title ‘Can we achieve health information for all by 2015?’. The authors called for WHO and others to champion the goal of Healthcare Information for All by 2015. The HIFA2015 campaign is a direct response to that challenge.
For further information on why HIFA2015 is needed, see here .
The HIFA2015 Strategy
The 2004 Lancet paper by Godlee et al emphasised that the global healthcare knowledge system is not meeting the needs of healthcare providers in resource-poor settings, largely because there is weak communication, understanding and advocacy among those involved in the production, exchange and use of healthcare knowledge. The strategy of HIFA2015 is therefore to promote communication, understanding and advocacy:
The HIFA2015 Strategy: click on the image to read in full size
For further explanation of the HIFA2015 Strategy, see here .
Administration
The HIFA2015 Steering Group is responsible for implementation, with input from HIFA2015 and CHILD2015 members and with expert assistance from the HIFA2015 Advisory Panel. The campaign is administered by the Global Healthcare Information Network, a non-profit organisation based in the UK.
For further information, see here .
Monitoring and Evaluation of HIFA2015
From January 2011 until August 2011, HIFA2015 was evaluated by a team of two professional evaluators, with funding from the Rockefeller Foundation. The HIFA2015 External Evaluation Report was published in October 2011.
HIFA2015 Evaluation Report (PDF, 50 pages, 1.3Mb)
HIFA2015 Evaluation Report – Executive Summary (PDF, 5 pages, 580kb)
HIFA2015 Evaluation Annex – Case Studies, Methodology, Glossary of Terms (PDF, 58 pages, 640kb)
HIFA2015 Evaluation Report – Response from Global Healthcare Information Network and HIFA2015 Steering Group (PDF, 3 pages, 70kb)
For further details on the M&E of HIFA2015, see here.
‘We live in a world with infinite possibilities. Hearts are transplanted, DNA is decoded, and new medical discoveries are made every day. Yet we continue to be stymied by how best to reach those in resource-poor settings with the most basic care and medicines that we take for granted. What could break through this conundrum? The answer is a committed community in both donor and developing countries to make the health of children a priority, combined with a simple package of interventions that address the greatest challenges to survival.’
Bill Frist & Richard Sezibera. The Lancet, 2009;374:1485-1486
