Arua Hospital ICT Hub Excites Health Workers
The New ICT Hub at Arua Regional Referral hospital - Photo Credit: Andrew Cohen Amvesi
ARUA. The newly established Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Hub at Arua regional referral hospital has caused a lot of excitement among health workers.
The hub, which is meant to ease access to the internet for health workers, was officially launched at the government facility on Wednesday, July 17, 2024.
The ICT hub established by the Health Service Commission will serve health workers at Arua Regional Hospital and all those in the district health facilities that fall under the regional hospital.
During the launch of the hub, Joyce Anite, a senior nursing officer at Arua Hospital, expressed gratitude to the Health Service Commission for coming to their aid, saying they have been spending a lot of money traveling to Kampala to submit job applications.
“I’m so excited about this ICT Hub because the hub is going to help us in very many ways. First of all, in the dynamics of doing our interviews and applying for these jobs, there are a lot of costs that we incur. Moving from Arua that long distance to Kampala, looking for where those offices are, going to those stairs and what, at times with lifts, things that we are not used to in our district, it will cut off all those hurdles,” Anite said.
Anite added that: “The hub will therefore, make it easy for us to apply for jobs whenever they are advertised and also it will make it easy for us to do our interviews because the interviews are going to be online. And also, as a nurse working in the hospital, we have so much research that we are doing, the hub will also strengthen our capacity in doing our research. It is an easier access for us than really what we have been going through before. I’m so grateful and so excited.”
According to Victor Waiswa, the Health Service Commission ICT officer, they have installed a total of eight equipment at Arua regional referral hospital ICT Hub.
“We installed six all-in-one computers which are costing about shs21m, then we have installed one printer and we have also acquired desktop covers for each of the six computers plus we have given them a WiFi router and TCP port switch for them to be able to share the wired internet,” Waiswa explained.
He noted that Arua regional referral hospital ICT Hub is one of the 17 hubs installed by the Health Service Commission in all the regional referral hospitals across the country at a cost of over shs165m.
Prof. Pius Okong, the Chairperson of the Health Service Commission said one of the things the commission does is to ensure that health workers have access to computers and internet for their own good so that they can do research and improve on their knowledge in different fields including government policies.
“So, the use of these computers we have delivered here with printers and a router for the internet among others is not only for them to be able to apply for jobs but it is also for those purposes. It is important that they have this specialized equipment to apply for jobs because the system which is online recognizes specifications of documents which are scanned using certain standards,” Okong remarked.
“So, when they use their telephones to scan their documents or go to internet cafes, sometimes they get it wrong. When they put their documents in the system and on the other side when you open and try to read, they are not readable. So, then they don’t get shortlisted. That is why we provided the printer and the scanner and many other ranges of activities so that the staff can put in the right documents with the specifications in the system, giving them a 100 percent chance of being shortlisted. Then the next after that is either the aptitude test or interviews,” Okong stressed.
Similarly, Dr. Ian Asiimwe, the Acting Director of Arua regional referral hospital said the ICT Hub has come timely for the health workers in the region.
“This ICT Hub is not only for Arua regional referral hospital staff but it is for all health workers in the region. If you are from Arua district, you can just come and get access and log in the portal and apply like any other person. So, the Arua ICT Hub will help everybody in the region,” Asiimwe confirmed.