University of the East Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Medical Center, Inc.

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1 ojs.upmin.edu.ph BANWA B (2023) 18: LET-001

Data Science, Health Informatics,

and Disease Surveillance in the Philippines

Gemiliano D. Aligui

University of the East Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Medical Center, Inc.

Correspondence: GD Aligui. Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs, University of the East Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Medical Center, Inc., 64 Aurora Blvd Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines 1113. Telephone: +63 28 715-5737. Email:

gdaligui@uerm.edu.ph

Editor: Emma Ruth V. Bayogan, PhD, University of the Philippines Mindanao, PHILIPPINES

Funding Source: Personally-funded research

Competing Interest: The author has declared no competing interest.

Citation: GD Aligui. 2023. Data science, health informatics, and disease surveillance in the Philippines. Banwa B 18: LET-001.

S P E C I A L I S S U E

This communication is intended to propose an idea for the development of a Center of Health Informatics and Data Science for Disease Surveillance in the Philippines.

The Philippines’ health information system and management have been described to need integration and harmonization. Policies and standards have been defined by the Department of Health (DOH) relative to the importance of central and regional offices following the standards of information and communication technology (Dayrit et al. 2018). While many of the variables are collected by hospitals and offices of the DOH, there is also important information collected by other agencies such as environment and agriculture, among others, that can be considered critical in developing a multi-dimensional data structure. These can be explored to build an expanded integration of data for disease surveillance. From a quick scan of online information, Table 1 shows two important

agencies of government that are sources of data.

These are the Department of Environment and Natural Resources - Environmental Management Bureau (DENR 2022) and the Department of Science and Technology - Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Authority (DOST- PAGASA c2023) where data can be sourced and integrated with health data. The data integration has the potential to generate least 27 domains or features, based on the Philippine Statistics Authority’s Philippine Statistical Yearbook (PSA 2021). In many ways, all data can be segregated by location or geographic analysis (Escamilla et al. 2014) using standard map locations from the DENR's National Mapping and Resource Information Authority (c1996–2021), and with this common locator, an administrative and data frame can be constructed. The administrative value of this locator will probably weigh heavily on local government units (LGU), for the simple reason that mitigation and intervention

Interdisciplinary Studies on Health

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must be done at the LGU. The LGU will serve as the basic unit of analysis and will contain all the data under which health, environment, natural resources, flooding, landslides, etc. will be integrated as multi-dimensional data. It is conceivable that this will require minimal cost or investment. The necessary data collection and management are already in place since data are collected regularly and all it takes will be their transmittal and integration. The integrated data can be processed by the Department of Science and Technology - Advanced Science and Technology Institute (DOST-ASTI), which houses one of the Philippines’ supercomputers (DOST-ASTI 2020). ASTI also has remotely sensed data with the ground receiving stations.

With the advancement of data science managed at the computing center of ASTI and following the paradigm to use local data to contextualize health information at the local level, we can attempt to explore what the data is telling us (Dammann 2019). All of these can inform policy not only at the level of the central DOH but at the local health board where intervention is most needed. Furthermore, as a national investment, the resource in ASTI can serve as a data science hub where Filipino graduate students can learn.

Sectoral data Sub-sectoral data Department of

Environment and Natural Resources

Environmental Management Bureau National Mapping and Resource Information Authority

Department of Science and Technology

Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration

TABLE 1 Non-health data sources to integrate with health data sources

of the East Ramon Magsaysay Memorial Medical Center, Inc. (UERMMMCI), former Assistant Director of the Department of Health - Research Institute for Tropical Medicine, and past Executive Director of the Department of Science and Technology - Philippine Council for Health Research and Development. He currently teaches at the UERMMMCI Graduate School and the Ateneo Graduate School of Business.

References

Dammann O. 2019. Data, information, evidence, and knowledge. Online J. Public Health Inform.

10(3): e224. https://doi.org/10.5210%2Fojphi.

v10i3.9631

Dayrit MM, Lagrada LP, Picazo OF, Pons MC, Villaverde MC. 2018. The Philippines health system review. Health Systems in Transition 8(2). https://apps.who.int/iris/

handle/10665/274579

[DENR] Department of Environment and Natural Resources. 2022. DENR unveils environmental quality data center. https://

w w w. d e n r. g o v. p h /i n d e x . p h p /n e w s - events/press-releases/3976-denr-unveils- environmental-quality-data-center

[DOST-ASTI] Department of Science and Technology – Advanced Science and Technology Institute. 2020. How DOST- ASTI’s supercomputing facility aids in advancing COVID-19 research initiatives.

https://asti.dost.gov.ph/communications/

n e w s - a r t i c l e s / h o w - d o s t - a s t i s - supercomputing-facility-aids-in-advancing- covid-19-research-initiatives/

[DOST-PAGASA] Department of Science and Technology, Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Authority. c2023. Climatological data. https://

www.pagasa.dost.gov.ph/climate/climate-data Escamilla V, Emch M, Dandalo L, Miller

WC, Martinson F, Hoffman I. 2014.

About the Author

Dr. Gemiliano D. Aligui is a medical doctor, with a degree in Master of Public Health, and a doctorate in Biology majoring in Epidemiology and Gerontology. He is currently the Vice President for Academic Affairs of the University

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Sampling at community level by using satellite imagery and geographical analysis. Bull World Health Organ. 92: 690–694. https://doi.

org/10.2471%2FBLT.14.140756

[NAMRIA] National Mapping and Resource Information Authority. c1996–2021. The central mapping agency of the Government of the Philippines. https://www.namria.gov.ph/

download.php

[PSA] Philippine Statistics Authority. 2021.

Philippine statistical yearbook 2021 (PSY).

https://psa.gov.ph/products-and-services/

publications/philippine-statistical-yearbook