PC: Feb 27 2018

Mary Jo Kochendorfer (Deactivated)

Tomorrow begins the final feature-development sprint prior to the 3.3 release.

We'll also do a component-release for Malawi.

Stock management within a facility is the main addition being introduced in 3.3 (see diagram). OpenLMIS still supports the external-fill workflow, however.

As a POC, an external system (OpenSRP) will be able to create an order within OpenLMIS which the system will then be able to fulfill. That's what the dotted "Direct Order" arrow within the diagram indicates.

More specifically, the "Direct Order" PoC allows an OpenSRP user at the health-facility level to create an order within OpenLMIS based on their ideal stock amount. Within OpenLMIS, a district-level facility will then be able to see and optionally fulfill the order.

This is shown as a dotted line because it's only at the PoC stage.

Mobile Strategy

• See https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aaZ3TkX3QPiLYCbhiuWDFgZ_lMmr_Cj-ZiqDFXmIlCI/edit#heading=h.dfeoaqkyaccw

Goal of the document: determine what kind of mobile app we should build if we had funding. Indirectly, the document addresses the value-based proposition of shifting from a paper-based system to a mobile app. 

Additional barriers to entry, encountered in India and Ethiopia:

1. Admins were not comfortable introducing devices which could be easily stolen.

2. Mobile hardware is seen as being relevant for a single application/health-program, and are thus seen as less flexible that use of a PC.

Q: How might the mobile app be bundled as a "side car" with/to related apps?
A: We don't yet have technical plans at that level of detail..

Q: Has anyone on the call been on a project involving barcodes?
A: Matt has. Additionally, the OpenSRP project in Zambia uses QR codes. Satish worked on barcoding within a supply chain in two different programs.

The lot and expiry aren't usually part of the barcode, which became problematic on one of Satish's projects.

Given the existence of a camera, it's possible to use OCR to read data from packaging rather than from the barcode. Such an approach may alleviate the aforementioned problem (and others).

Q: How should the mobile strategy address integration with systems which have already been deployed? 
A: In general, let's definitely use pre-existing solutions as much as possible. We'll also want to address SIGLUS. At some point, we should evaluate the systems which are already in place. For now, let's try to determine our goals. That's the purpose of the current document. After agreeing on goals, an evaluation of options (including a survey of existing options) would be appropriate.

Please feel welcome to add comments to the shared google doc and share thoughts on the email thread. Folks clearly have experience in this realm, and it would be great to learn from it.

Other Questions:

• What is the progression from paper based to direct-to-digital interactions?
• How often do the end users need to interact with the LMIS? Are we targeting the use case of day-to-day stock management, or just requesting more stock?
• What do people do now? For example, we assume they keep track of stock interactions on paper. Do they call their orders in? If so, what are the workflows?

Two Quick Requests

Market Research: What other systems should we be following and keeping up with?

Expanding number of implementation support: Other partners and players in the electronic LMIS space? Or technology vendors we should be aware of?

• http://softworksbd.com/index.php

No OpenLMIS abstract was selected