Mariam Ibrahim Sheikh, Sr. Program Manager and Boniface Owino, Data Analyst with development initiatives on the role of data in health resource mapping to support initiatives to crowd-in finance and generate data for decision making,and for various consumers is formats and visualisations pertinent to them.

1. Using data to strengthen
health systems: Spotlight
on Kenya

2. We are
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org

3. Our work
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / devinit.org

4. Data use
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org
Our focus is to:
• Empower people to use data
effectively.
• Help and encourage those holding
valuable information to make data
available, accessible and usable.
• Contribute to the global ‘data
revolution’ movement to improve data
quality and use to drive poverty
eradication and sustainable
development.

5. Inequalities in the
health sector

6. Health inequalities
The Spotlight on Kenya is a data visualisation platform bringing together publicly
available official data on socio-economic indicators and financial resources.
Using the Spotlight on Kenya we can explore inequalities in the health sector in
Kenya, based on the KDHS 2014 data.
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org

7. Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org
Proportion of births attended
by skilled personnel: Figure 1
The proportion of
births attended by
skilled health
personnel is less than
30% in five counties –
Samburu, West
Pokot, Marsabit, Wajir
and Turkana.
By contrast, over 85%
of births are attended
by skilled health
personnel in –
Kiambu, Kirinyaga,
Nairobi, Nyeri and
Muranga County.

8. Use of modern contraceptives:
Figure 2
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org
Less than 30% of married
women (15–49 years)
use modern
contraceptive methods in
nine counties – Mandera,
Wajir, Garissa, Turkana,
Marsabit, West Pokot,
Samburu, Tana River and
Isiolo.
By contrast over 65% of
married women (15–49
years) living in the top
five counties (Kirinyaga,
Meru, Kiambu, Machakos
and Embu) use modern
contraceptive methods.
Mandera has the lowest score of just 2% compared with Kirinyaga which leads with 76%.

9. Linking health financing to
health needs
Using Elgeyo Marakwet County as an example, we find that:
• 65% of births are attended by skilled personnel – need for improved maternal care so every birth is
attended by skilled personnel
• 43.6% of women (15–49 years) use any modern contraceptives
• 86.6% of one-year old children are immunised against measles
• 75% of diseases reported by outpatients are controllable (e.g. respiratory infections, pneumonia,
skin infections, diarrhoea)
Thus, there is need for improved provision of preventive and promotive health services.
The next slide shows that the health sector has been prioritised in budgetary allocation, accounting for
the largest share (35%) of the county’s total budget.
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org

10. Expenditure in Elgeyo
Marakwet County: Figure 3

11. Health expenditure in Elgeyo
Marakwet County
Expenditure has changed from 2015/16 to 2016/17 as follows:
• Preventive and promotive health expenditure – reduced by 6.47% from Kshs 54.15m to
Kshs 50.65m
• Health infrastructure development expenditure – reduced by 47.77% from Kshs 166m
to Kshs 86.7m
• By contrast, expenditure on curative and rehabilitative services increased by 33.32%
from Kshs 84.48m to Kshs 112.62m
This demonstrates a clear shift in resource allocation that decision-makers must ensure
drives the best health outcomes for people.
Addressing health needs requires investment in regular collection and use of quality data to
ensure effective resource allocation.
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org

12. Interoperability and associated
challenges
Interoperability – The ability for two or more (independently-developed)
data systems to interact meaningfully
• Communicate meaningfully
• Exchange data or services
Major challenges
• Surveys using different data representations
• Surveys using different control models
• Current data systems implementing different semantics or semantic
interpretations
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org

13. Data opportunities (call for
partnerships)
• Coordination is needed in approach to health sector data, and
advocacy is needed around data interoperability
• Emphasis on securing commitments in opening up health data
and statistics in general
• Open data in the health sector – there is a fair amount of health
data on the KODI platform and DHS and other health sector
survey data in Kenya is available. However, it is not machine
readable (in pdf format)
• Lack of available administrative data from health centres.
DHIS2 is down and there is no timeline on when it will be live
again
Using data to strengthen health systems: Spotlight on Kenya / www.devinit.org