Job Title: Health Information Systems (HIS) Developer
Job Ref.: GPRT-262457
Background: The UCSF has Cooperative Agreements with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – Kenya (CDC-Kenya) to provide technical assistance to the Ministry of Health and its partners for multiple HIV and STI Surveillance and program Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) activities.
They are recruiting individuals through their affiliated international NGO ‘Global Programs for Research & Training’ to serve as an HIS Developer for these activities. The assignment is based in Nairobi, and the incumbent would likely begin working on March 1st, 2016.
This position requires a one-year commitment, with the potential for extension at the end of the period, subject to funding availability.
Main Duties:
The primary function of this position is to support UCSF with its data needs by developing databases, dashboards, apps and other software to support its projects and programmes.
The HIS Developer is expected to design databases to meet the needs for specific projects.
Some projects will require the developer to design data entry screens for these databases, while other projects will require the developer to import data form existing data sources into a UCSF-managed database, sometimes with data transformations.
Therefore, an understanding of SQL is critical. Most projects will require the data to be disclosed via dashboards – often with some transformation or analysis of that data before it gets displayed.
For example, data that originates from a single health facility may need to be aggregated into a district, provincial or national view on the dashboard. Visualising data on dashboards will be a critical component of the developer.
Additional software development needs may arise occasionally, such as the development of mobile apps, or interoperability layers between existing systems.
An example of that would be an implementation of OpenHIE. As an integral part of the UCSF Kenya Office, the Software Developer will be expected to meet with stakeholders, funders and government officials, and draw up requirements based on their needs.
Specific Roles and Responsibilities:
Under the direction of the UCSF Senior Manager for Global Health Informatics Officer, the HIS Developer will work with the UCSF Strategic Information (SI) team, the Global Programs in-country SI team, and USG and GOK colleagues to:
- Establish needs and requirements for any database or information system
- Determine the appropriate frameworks, tools and technologies to be used for implementing any database or information system, taking context, existing capacity and other guiding principles (e.g. open source, already in use in the health sector) into account
- Based on agreed specifications, design, develop and maintain SQL-based databases, primarily using open source tools such as MySQL and PostgreSQL
- Based on agreed specifications, develop web-based dashboards and other websites, including web apps that summarise, display, visualise data and make datasets available for download and further analysis
- Develop output reports using popular reporting tools (such as Jasper Reports) that pre-analyse and visualise data, and allow other people to pull those reports online (through a website/dashboard)
- Develop interfaces for interoperability to enable data syncing between databases
- Any other duties assigned related to this job description
Minimum Requirements:
- An appropriate degree in computer science, information systems or software engineering with a focus on software development or equivalent degree with five years’ experience – or at least ten years of demonstrable experience in software development
- At least five years of experience in developing information systems, ideally with a focus on health information systems, in popular languages such as JAVA, PHP, Python, or C#. Open-source languages are highly preferable.
- Demonstrable experience in working with databases and SQL, including writing SQL queries
- An understanding of popular tools currently in the health sector such as ODK, DHIS2 and OpenMRS
- Working experience with software development and maintenance tools like Spring, Hibernate, JQuery, Subversion, Git, Restful web services, Agile methodology, Jasper server, Android SDK
- Experience with one or more of the following are considered advantages:
- (Bio)statistics
- Monitoring and Evaluation
- Epidemiology
- Working in the health sector
TO APPLY, all applicants must address each selection criterion detailed in the minimum requirements above with specific and comprehensive information supporting each item.
All applications must include the following:
- A current CV with names and telephone numbers for 3 referees
- Copies of academic and professional certificates
- Salary history
(Subject of the email should be the title of the POSITION APPLIED FOR + JOB REF)
How to Apply
If you meet the above criteria, send your application to jobsfresh254@gmail.com (Subject of the email should be the title of the POSITION APPLIED FOR + JOB REF)
If you are not interested in this opportunity today, please refer any friend or colleague you know that might suit the required profile.
Applications NOT MEETING minimum requirements will not be considered.
Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted
Note: We do not charge any fees for receiving and reviewing applications or for interviews