VL Ghana Uses Mobile Technology to Improve School-Based Distribution of ITNs

This week’s Fist Bump Friday goes out to VectorLink Ghana for their support to Ghana’s NMCP in developing the mobile application Net4Schs App, which records data during school-based distribution (SBD) of ITNs. The Global Health Supply Chain – Procurement and Supply Management also supported this initiative.

The Net4Schs App eliminates the delay in data capture and enhances data accuracy as data can be synchronized daily and retrieved when needed from the Net4Schs platform housed by NMCP. To assess its field practicality and address any challenges before a full deployment for the 2020 SBD, implementing partners carried out a small-scale field assessment during the week of March 9. Twifo Hemang Lower Denkyira District and Cape Coast Metro from the Central region of Ghana were selected as test districts of the Net4Schs App.

ITNs were distributed to pupils in classes 2 and 6 in the two districts from March 9-13, 2020. Net4Schls shows a total of 13,479 ITNs were distributed in 267 primary schools across the districts. Eighty percent of reported data were entered by circuit supervisors within the week of distribution with minimal data entry errors. Previously, the same data collection could take a month to obtain with many data errors arising from the completion of multiple summary forms at the circuit, district and regional levels. The Net4Schls app eliminates the use of paper data collection and maintains the monitoring forms from all supervisors. The data is now available for analysis instantly unlike paper-based forms.

Congrats VL Ghana for this incredible innovation!