WHO Collaborating Center for Health Information Systems, Statistics and Analysis

In July 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) designated the Institute as the WHO Collaborating Centre for Health Statistics and Analysis (WHO CC HSA). Until July 2018, its scope of work included assistance to WHO in preparing information on mortality and morbidity among the Russian population, analysis of trends in health of the Russian population, life expectancy forecast and assessment. The parties also participated in joint studies organized under the leadership of WHO in the European Region to analyze reliability of coding of causes of death in Russia and in the CIS countries. An important objective of the Collaborating center was to promote dissemination of research results on the coding of causes of death, to conduct specialized training (with support of WHO) in rules for coding causes of death using the developed information technologies, as well as to develop tools for health data analysis and interpretation in line with the international classifications.

A more detailed work overview of the Collaborating Center in the period from 2014 to 2018 is available from the old version of the Institute's website: https://old.mednet.ru/ru/sotrudnichayushhij-czentr-voz-po-statistike-i-analizu-zdorovya-naseleniya.html

In 2019, the Center was renamed - WHO Collaborating Center for Health Information Systems, Health Statistics and Analysis (WHO CC HISHSA). The expanded Workplan until 2022 included the following tasks:

1) Mortality and causes of death – registration of death, coding, analysis, quality control, training.

This activity covers all aspects of public mortality statistics as part of a larger goal of strengthening national health information systems and providing WHO with data on causes of death (COD).

This task is expected to be accomplished through:

• facilitating evaluation of the national civil registration and vital statistics systems (CRVS), especially with regard to processing and reporting data on death causes;
• planning and building capacity in countries to improve the process of death registration and the use of ICD for coding and analyzing statistics using ANACOD and other tools developed by WHO for this purpose;
• assisting countries in evaluating quality of mortality statistics (COD) and advising in planning and developing validation studies on data on causes of death.

2) Support for the development of publications and tools in Russian in collaboration with WHO.

This task includes all components related to the development of health information systems at the national level according to «Support tool to assess health information systems and develop and strengthen health information strategies» (http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/278741/Support-tool-assess-HIS-en.pdf) and  «National eHealth strategy toolkit» (https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/75211).

The purpose is to strengthen health information systems in the WHO European Region to collect evidence-based data on health conditions in different countries. These data can be used to identify national priorities, identify best practices and potential areas for improvement, inform policy makers and officers in charge of resource allocation in countries, as well as target populations in need.

This task is expected to be accomplished through:

• supporting the integrated evaluation of national health information systems by collecting information for evaluation, conducting evaluation, and drafting evaluation reports through participation in the WHO-led missions in individual countries;
• participating in capacity-building workshops (supported by WHO) aimed at implementing recommendations made on the basis of the health information system evaluation - focusing on data sources, data flows, monitoring and evaluation, analysis and interpretation of health information;
• counselling the CIS member States in developing national public health monitoring systems by reviewing national systems.

3) Burden of disease – national studies, analysis, and collaboration.

This task includes support for national and subnational burden of disease studies in the CIS countries and assistance of the CIS countries in conducting their own studies. This work will be carried out in close collaboration with the European Network for Disease Control and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME).

This task is expected to be accomplished through:

• participating in WHO activities to evaluate data sources and national health information systems available to CIS countries for burden of disease studies;
• reviewing Manual on evaluating Disease Burden in countries for the purpose of conducting research in the CIS countries;
• assisting WHO in training specialists in methods of assessing burden of disease in Russian;
• counselling the CIS countries in implementing national and subnational evaluation of burden of disease in line with the Manual.

2018-2022 Workplan of the WHO Collaborating Center for Health Information Systems, Statistics and Analysis.

Head

Vladimir I. Starodubov

Scientific Director, Federal Research Institute for Health Organization and Informatics of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Doctor of medical science, Full professor, Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences 

Contacts 

Tel. +7 (495) 619-00-70

starodubov@mednet.ru