The Millennium Villages Project, supported by Millennium Promise Alliance and the Earth Institute at Columbia University, is a bottom-up approach to lift developing country villages out of the poverty trap that afflicts more than a billion people worldwide. The Millennium Villages’ team of experts in Agriculture, Nutrition and Health, Economics, Energy, Water, Agribusiness, Environment and Information Technology are working with local communities and governments to apply a proven holistic package of interventions to help villages get out of extreme poverty and meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). With support from Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) and funding from the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom, a SADA Millennium Village has been established in parts of the West Mamprusi and Builsa Districts of the Northern and Upper East Regions of Ghana. The project area covers a cluster of contiguous rural communities with an estimated population of 25,000 people.

Description Of Job

Job Summary
Purpose of the Position:
The role of the eHealth Specialist will be to enhance the achievement of the MDGs related to health through implementation and support for eHealth infrastructure that integrates facility-based and community health worker information systems.  The eHealth Specialist will be responsible for developing, implementing and supporting software-based solutions for use in the MVP sites of Northern Ghana.  The eHealth Specialist will be based at Northern Ghana but will be expected to travel to provide solution implementation support of others regions in Ghana.  The eHealth Specialist is expected to work with the different sector teams, especially the health sector teams, where solutions will be targeted.  The eHealth Specialist will also work closely with members of the health informatics and community health worker (CHW) teams.

The e-Health Specialist will be directly supervised by the Health Coordinator and technical supervision will be provided by Regional e-Health Coordinator and the global eHealth team.

Responsibilities/Duties:
Duties and responsibilities of the eHealth Specialist include, but are not limited to, the following:

•  Familiarizing him/herself with MVP, the local primary health care system and the community health worker program established in the MVP cluster.
•  Act as an ambassador and advocate for e-health programmes and service improvement initiatives.
•  Establish a working relationship with Ministry of Health (MoH), local District Health Information System (DHIS) team and other local partners working on eHealth solutions in Northern Ghana.
•  Provide technical support to the MVP eHealth and mHealth implementation in the cluster – including OpenMRS, Verbal Autopsy, Telemedicine and Commcare, through trouble-shooting and fixing any bugs.
•  Act as the lead change facilitator within health team and support staffs in the use of e-Health applications and other service improvement techniques through effective training facilitation.
•  Work with health team to increase service improvement, change and e-Health project management capacity and capability within the MVP cluster. And also ensure that projects are delivered to time and budget; negotiate additional support or resources as necessary.
•  Set up and maintain all project documentation including the project brief, communication plan, risk and issues log, lessons learned log, highlight reports and relevant timelines/ milestone trackers.
•  Ensure robust data collection, collation, and analysis methods are in place, working closely with informatics colleagues as necessary.
•  Assist Community Health workers (CHWs) to promptly resolve all technical problems and ensures that the electronic medical record applications are operational at all times.
•  Analyse complex data (qualitative and quantitative) and present/ report data to support real-time usage of data for intervention and strategic planning.
•  Support the integration of OpenMRS EMR with other applications as appropriate to aggregate and integrate data within the cluster.
•  Design and implement training modules for data entry, CHW Manager, clinics staffs on clinical data capture/use and Community health workers on e-Health applications and reporting.
•  Work with the Data Manager through provision of relevant monitoring and evaluation data for the Health Team to provide real-time interventions.
•  Work with the ICT Manager to ensure connectivity in the cluster between clinics, CHWs and remote access to the eHealth server for support and data back-up
•  Regularly communicate with the MDG Centre and MVP Health Team in New York, providing updates on the status and needs of the e/m-Health systems in the cluster.
•  Other duties as may be assigned by supervisor

Terms of offer:
MVP offers a competitive salary with an excellent benefits package. The employment contract is for a period of one year with the possibility of renewal. MVP prides itself on its collegial, supportive and gender sensitive working environment and believes that staff diversity promotes excellence. Women are strongly encouraged to apply.

Qualification Required & Experience

Qualifications/Requirements

•  Holder of degrees in both 1) Information Technology field and 2) Medical, Nursing or Public Health field
•  Conversant with Windows and Linux system administration
•  Project Management (Prince 2) certification will be an added advantage.
•  Knowledge of a programming language like Java and Python-Django will be an added advantage
•  Experience in configuring and maintaining OpenMRS highly preferred
•  Knowledge of network configuration and maintenance highly preferred
•  Proponent of and user of Open Source Solutions

Individual Qualities

•  Possess strong team working ethics and organizational skills
•  Ability to manage conflict or contentious situations
•  Possess excellent leadership and problem skills
•  Excellent  interpersonal and communication skills
•  Fluency in English required, and working knowledge of French preferred
•  Must be highly responsible and posses high standards of personal integrity
•  Flexible and adaptable to new challenges
•  Ability to influence people to engage in change
•  Tactful and diplomatic

How To Apply For The Job

Applications:
Applicants should apply by email, sending a cover letter summarizing their relevance to this position, a full C.V. and names and contact information of three referees knowledgeable about the candidate’s professional qualifications and work experience to: sadamvp@gmail.com with copies to employment@mdgwca.org and jacob.ubindam@millenniumpromise.org.
“Application for SADA MVP eHealth Specialist” should be clearly marked on the subject line of the email message.

Closing Date: 28 August, 2012

We invite you to learn more about us at:

www.millenniumvillages.org,
www.millenniumpromise.org,
www.unmillenniumproject.org,
www.mdgcentre.org