1.4. Aim and Objectives of this Thesis

This thesis aims at the construction of a health information system for the compilation and presentation of health indicators which are suitable for decision-making. The health information system must support decision-makers in the district health system of the Kabarole district, Uganda. As a result of this, the health information system shall contribute to guarantee the universal coverage of basic health services of the district.

In order to establish the mentioned aim, the following objectives have to be fulfilled after collecting the necessary rudiments:

• (i) The health information system must facilitate statements on the health status of the population. Therefore suitable health indicators have to be defined. This objective is limited by the restriction, that new forms for data collection may not be introduced.
• (ii) The health information system must integrate existing structures for processing information. If necessary, these have to be supplemented or mapped onto an application software product. Therefore the existing structures have to be analyzed.
• (iii) The health information system must handle data which are obtained in the district by means of a database. Therefore a suitable database scheme has to be designed.
• (iv) The health information system must present the compiled health indicators to decision-makers on different organizational levels of the district health system. Therefore respectively suitable forms of presentation have to be found.
• (v) The application software product onto which parts of the health information system are being mapped must be easily accessible for inexperienced users. Therefore the results of (i) to (iv) have to be embedded into a lucid user-prompting. Also, a users manual has to be provided.
• (vi) The application software product must run without future maintenance. Therefore it has to be programmed carefully and tested severely to enable extensive troubleshooting.