Musings on software, system administration, public health, research and international development.

Investigating human resources for health (mal)distribution in the DRC

My dissertation focuses on the human resources for health (HRH) distribution in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). As part of this work, I'd like to investigate the distribution of human resources for health across the health zones of the DRC. We'll start with an

The sad tale of clownfish

This is a story about the little software that could - a tiny application for archiving government reports by CC-ing an email address. It taught me that the biggest challengesin development work are human, not technical. There isn't a real moral here, just a tale from the software

Preventing ODK submissions from prehistory

When doing survey data collection, accurate timestamps are extremely important for establishing chronology and ensuring data accuracy, yet they are often difficult to ensure accuracy. In this post, I'll walk through a strategy I've used previously to try and get accurate data using ODK Collect. Motivation

Using the DHIS2 pyramid in ODK forms

One of the hardest elements of data collection, particularly in low resource environments, is to ensure accuracy of the information being recorded. Often, not enough time is dedicated to validation of data collection instruments, training of data collectors, and thinking through data analysis workflows before the deployment of data collection

Airalo for Mobile Data in the DRC

I recently (March 2024) took a research trip to the DRC and needed an internet connection whilst there. Unfortunately, my old Vodacom SIM was expired, so I was left looking for alternatives to get mobile data. My first attempt was GoogleFi, but they discourage users from using their international SIMs

Self-hosting ODK Central (under your college dorm bed)

The ODK suite is a robust, and flexible set of tools for collecting data. At my previous employer, we used ODK to collect millions of submissions from dozens of forms, often with associated geolocation information, images, and timestamped metadata. Since the ODK software is open source, we were able to

Let's get the SNIS RDC health pyramid in R

I have many visions for this blog, but we have to start somewhere and here seems as good a place as any. Today's challenge is to create the SNIS RDC "health pyramid" in R. For anyone unfamiliar, the "health pyramid" is an affectionate term