Authors : P.A. Idowu and A.S. Ajayi
Abstract: In an attempt to reduce paper work, forestall the problem of case notes getting lost in transit, shield the contents of case notes away from patients which could also lead to a psychological breakdown by the patient and as a result of all these reduce mortality rate in the primary health care centres in Nigeria, an electronic referral system is designed to alleviate all these aforementioned problems. Medical personnel�s (such as nurses, local health officers and doctors) were interviewed in an attempt to acquire a detailed knowledge of their manual process of referring patient. The results showed that patients� case notes (which encompass patients� symptom, diagnosis, medication with the clinical number) were transmitted using mobile phone on a Global System for Mobile Communication carrier from the referral package within few seconds. In conclusion, the work has the potential to increase medical personnel productivity, reduce prenatal and neonatal mortality rates, improve medical care and minimize the cost of referral since GSM facilities are already on ground and some mobile operators offers free text services.
P.A. Idowu and A.S. Ajayi , 2008. GSM Based Referral System for Primary Health Care Centres in Nigeria. International Journal of Soft Computing, 3: 421-427.