At a regional meeting in Monrovia, Liberia in May, the West African Health Organization (WAHO) presented promising results from a pilot of the iHRIS Manage software in the Northern region of Ghana. iHRIS Manage is a software package that enables an organization to design and manage a comprehensive human resources strategy, which was developed by the Capacity Project and supported by CapacityPlus, both led by IntraHealth International.

The software pilot was a joint effort between WAHO and the Ghana Ministry of Health. Initial findings suggest that the software was successfully customized and configured to suit the Health Services of the Northern Region of Ghana’s organizational structure and needs. Pleased with the initial pilot, Ghanaian officials announced their plans to roll out iHRIS Manage in the other regions of the country.

Representatives from four other countries also expressed interest in adopting the software. Dykki Settle, team lead for health informatics for the IntraHealth-led CapacityPlus  project, was at the meeting and spoke on CapacityPlus and the iHRIS software. He noted the meeting marked an important milestone: “The pilot was conducted with only minimal virtual support from CapacityPlus; that means this is the first truly independent review and dissemination of the iHRIS software,” stated Settle.

WAHO was created by the Economic Community of West African States and serves 15 member countries. Human resources managers from 12 of the 15 countries attended the regional meeting, along with representatives from the World Health Organization, the Global Health Workforce Alliance, and the Health Metrics Network.