This document outlines the 8-stage planning process for health programs: 1. Form a competent working team of various health professionals and stakeholders. 2. Develop statements of health policies and broad goals that are politically supported. 3. Gather necessary demographic, epidemiological, economic, and administrative information. 4. Prioritize key health problems based on factors like mortality, public preferences, and costs. 5. Propose major alternative approaches to address priorities, detailing technical aspects, organization, costs and benefits.

1. PLANNING PROCESS OF
HEALTH PROGRAM
AP DR ANIZA ISMAIL
Community Health Department UKM
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2. DEFINITION OF PLANNING
A process that involves defining the organization’s
goals, establishing an overall strategy for achieving
those goals and developing a comprehensive set of
plans to integrate and coordinate organizational work
(Robbin & Coulter 2002)
The process of preparing a set of decisions for action
in the future, directed at achieving goals by
preferable means.( Dror 1995)
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3. PLANNING PROCESS
 DEFINITION:
A process which permits a series of
alternative choices in order to achieve the
goal and objectives (Robbin & Coulter 2002)
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4. STAGES OF PLANNING
1. Form a competence working team.
2. Statement of policy and broad goals.
3. Information gathering.
4. Priority statement of health problems.
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5. STAGES OF PLANNING
5. Plan outline with statement of major
alternative proposals.
6. Development of detail plan with
vision,mission,objectives, targets and
standards.
7. Implementation as part of planning
process.
8. Evaluation.
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6. 1. FORM A COMPETENCE WORKING TEAM
 Participation:
 Broad and comprehensive planning need
proportionate representative of consumers
and other interest groups.
 Program planning and project planning
need more health professionals.
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7. 1. FORM A COMPETENCE WORKING TEAM
 Planning Unit:
 Composed of different types of health
professionals, economists, social scientists,
administrators and other relevant professionals.
 Work closely and support the administrative
structure.
 Access to different sectors and levels of the
health systems bring realism into planning.
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8. 1 FORM A COMPETENCE WORKING TEAM
 Educational Process:
 Members of planning unit are competently
trained.
 Teaching technical planning, data gathering
skills, economic theory and analytical
methodology, throughout administrative
structure.
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9. 2. STATEMENT OF POLICY AND BROAD
GOALS
 Health policies and goals must be politically
determined.
 Develop skills in mobilizing political opinions.
 Planning goals fit the political group
responsible for implementation.
 Long-term goals and short-range objectives
should be stated explicitly with clear
recognition of time and priority implications.
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10. 2. STATEMENT OF POLICY AND BROAD
GOALS
 Policy-makers need to be made aware of the
cyclic nature of planning, where plan
objectives may be revised on the basis of
experience gained.
 Continuity must be maintained by constantly
looking ahead to the next plan period.
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11. 3. INFORMATION GATHERING
 If sources of information are good, the
planning unit need only compile and analyze
the data to particular planning objectives.
 Where data are deficient, the planning unit
may have to organize their own survey or
other data gathering systems.
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12. 3. INFORMATION GATHERING
 Good planning requires eliminating from the
information system all items that are not
related to clear plan objectives and functional
use.
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13.  Type of information:
 Demographic information with population
projections.
 Epidemiologic, specifically information on
the frequency and distribution of major
health problems.
 Economic data involving accurate cost
accounting of specific health activities
(including indirect costs) and economic
analysis.
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14.  Type of information:
 Utilization of facilities and the functional
patterns of work of various types of
personnel.
 Administrative data on the availability and
projection of both manpower and facilities
resources.
 Research in methodology of measuring
demand for various categories of services.
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15. 4. PRIORITY STATEMENT OF HEALTH
PROBLEMS
 Usually considered the most crucial
stage in the planning process.
 Judgment, wisdom and unique ability to
synthesize the numerous relevant
details.
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16.  To balance variables with very different
quantitative relationships and in
different dimensional scales:
 Relative mortality and morbidity.
 What the public wants and what health
programs will be acceptable.
 Administrative framework to provide
services and the necessary personnel.
 Relative costs of various health programs.
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17. 5. STATEMENT OF MAJOR ALTERNATIVE
PROPOSALS
 Develop alternative proposals on
possible ways of coping with the health
problems defined.
 A clear outline for each alternative
approach provides a ready basis for
comparison.
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18. 5. STATEMENT OF MAJOR ALTERNATIVE
PROPOSALS
 Outline should include:
 Clear definition of technical aspects of the
program.
 Organizational framework required.
 Personnel and facilities needed.
 Costs in comparable financial terms.
 Approximate benefits expected relative to priority
of concern.
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19. 5. STATEMENT OF MAJOR ALTERNATIVE
PROPOSALS
 Problem of deciding between health activities
that have multiple impacts compared to
those with a single impact.
 Differences between:
 Comprehensive planning
 Program planning
 Project planning
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20. COMPREHENSIVE PLANNING
 Provides general framework for health
development.
 Concerned with problem of priorities and the
relative stress given to various programs and
projects.
 Overall conceptual structure within which
program and project planning can be done.
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21. PROGRAM PLANNING
 Directed towards broad-impact activities that
will affect a number of health problems.
 Eg. Women health program will:
 Reduce mortality and morbidity due to cancer
diseases
 Promote healthy women development.
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22. PROJECT PLANNING
 Concerned with high-impact health activities
directed against single health problems.
 Eg. Vaccination program among reproductive
women project will address the problem of
cancer related diseases among women
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23. 6. DEVELOPMENT OF DETAIL PLAN WITH
OBJECTIVES, TARGETS, AND STANDARDS
 Construction of a detailed plan document is usually
worked out in phases.
 Long-term goals with proposed steps are
specifically stated with increasing details and
specificity for more immediate periods.
 Successful implementation of a detailed program
need greater local involvement (decentralization).
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24. 6. DEVELOPMENT OF DETAIL PLAN WITH
OBJECTIVES, TARGETS, AND STANDARDS
 Controls for effective decentralization:
 Development of appropriate standards of
performance.
 Target-setting is the central unit’s responsibility
with agreement of local levels.
 Standard-setting and target-setting should be
realistic
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25. 7. IMPLEMENTATION AS PART OF
PLANNING PROCESS
 Implementation is included as a n integral part of
planning to enable planning to be a dynamic and
continuing activity.
 A plan should be innovative and contain the seeds
of progressive change.
 Probability of a plan being accepted increases
proportionately with the extent to which health
personnel, political leaders, and the public
participate in the planning process.
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26. 8. EVALUATION
 Planning, implementation and evaluation are all-in-
one process of a cyclic nature with the evaluation
stage leading directly into the initiation of a new
planning cycle.
 Continuing evaluation:
 Encourage continuing self-evaluation by local health
units for administrative purposes.
 Involves process and seeing that standards and targets
are being met.
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27. 8. EVALUATION
 Periodic Evaluation:
 More focused evaluation specifically for plan
revision.
 Centrally-directed activity with the primary
purpose of quantifying achievement.
 Usually timed to precede the evaluation of a new
major plan or the modification of an existing one.
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28. 8. EVALUATION
 Other assessment issues, whether:
 Original goals and objectives were appropriate.
 Resource development moving in the right direction, in
terms of facilities and manpower.
 Priority setting, was in fact justified by preceding
experience.
 Data gathering system is producing useful information.
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29.  THANK YOU
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