POWERING HEALTH FACILITIES - APPROACH
The following emerging standards for national healthcare facility mapping are from the Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL) Powering Health Facilities - Approach, pg. 2:
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An initial mapping of all health facilities in the country is required, focusing on the current ‘power status’ of each facility. Additional information to collect includes proximity to the grid, lay-out of the health facility, and GIS coordinates.
The data will likely come from several sources and could include both primary sources (e.g. rapid surveys) and secondary sources (available data from Government and other agencies). Some datasets are likely to be more available and reliable – e.g. cold chain power status, or on-grid versus off-grid – and can be used as proxies to prioritize certain facilities over others. An important component in this step is the categorization or classification of health facilities, to better understand the types of health services that are offered at different levels of care. Lastly, overlaying the dataset with current and planned grid extension plans – at least in the near term – will further help identify priority sites. A priority index can be developed, including: proximity to grid, type of facility, catchment area (and thus people served by the facility), other existing power sources (if data is available). OUTCOME: Identified and prioritized health facilities for interventions. |
The (SEforALL) Powering Health Facilities - Approach states or implies the following measures for healthcare facilities mapping:
- Categorization or classification of health facility, including types of health services that are offered at different levels of care;
- Current power status of each facility (access to electricity; power reliability), including type of electric power resources (if any) and other existing energy resources and end-use application (generator, fuel supplies, etc.);
- Proximity to the national electric power grid, including overlay with current and near-term grid extension plans;
- Physical lay-out of the healthcare facility, including site map, facility floor plans;
- GIS (geographic information systems) location; GIS location of nearest nation electric power grid connection)
- Medical equipment requiring electric power or other energy services, including specific requirements for current or planned level of care by existing or proposed categorization or classification of health facility;
- Cold chain power status;
- Description of catchment area, including geographic characteristics and demographic data;
- Staffing requirements, including current or planned staffing;
- Staff housing requirements (on-site vs. off-site); and
- Planned facility improvements, including specific level of care requirements.
Based upon the assessment of healthcare facilities utilizing these measures by categorization or classification of health facilities and levels of care (or service availability), a priority index can be developed whereby each healthcare facility is ranked and prioritized for access to electric power and/or power reliability interventions, and/or other energy services.
See emerging WHO and MEMD standards described in Section 2, Lesson Plan: