Facility Reconciliation—Geopolitical Alignment
The facility reconciliation process is simplified when the PEPFAR organization unit hierarchy is harmonized with the geopolitical hierarchy of the country’s Master Facility List (MFL) (Ministry of Health [MoH] facility list).
Phase I of the facility reconciliation allows the country team to harmonize the hierarchies.
When should I do geopolitical alignment?
There are several use cases in which harmonization is required.
You should conduct harmonization if:
- Your country’s MFL has additional levels that are not part of the country hierarchy in DATIM, and you would like to add them.
- Your country underwent redistricting that has been reflected in the MFL but not in DATIM, and you would like the redistricting reflected in DATIM.
A simple case is districts in which PEPFAR does not provide HIV services that you would like to add to DATIM. This use case can be worked out in either Phase I or Phase II of facility reconciliation. You can add the district using the default DHIS2 application.
Can I skip the geopolitical alignment phase?
There are several situations in which geopolitical alignment is not required, and you can proceed to Phase II directly. These situations are described as follows.
- The MoH hierarchy has a level that is not present in DATIM. Facility reconciliation can be conducted even if one of the levels above the facility level is missing in DATIM. Please refer to the facility reconciliation application materials for details.
- The names of regions, zones, districts, or other entities do not match exactly. In this case, you can conduct facility reconciliation without updating names. However, if you would like names of organization units in DATIM to be updated, you should conduct Phase I.
- A new district or other entity needs to be added to DATIM (as was mentioned in the simple use case above).
If you are unsure whether you should be conducting geopolitical alignment, please consult with DATIM Support.
How do I conduct geopolitical alignment?
Geopolitical alignment is done using the DHIS2 Organization Unit Maintenance application in GeoAlign. Please liaise with the site administrator(s) to conduct geopolitical alignment for your operating unit.
The DATIM site administration guide provides details on most of the operations required for conducting the geopolitical alignment. Please review the organization hierarchy changes policy and guidance, and the site change operation template here: Organization Hierarchy Changes Policy and Guidance. Countries that have already conducted their facility reconciliation in GOFR should plan to maintain facility harmonization in subsequent years by following the OU Hierarchy Changes Policy and submitting requested changes to DATIM Support using the site change operation template provided.
Accessing the organization unit maintenance app
To access the organization unit maintenance app in GeoAlign:
- Login to https://geoalign.datim.org/.
- Using the “Search apps” menu, locate and click on the “Maintenance” application.
- Locate the “Organisation unit” application, and click on it.
Adding an organization unit
To add a new organization unit, locate the parent organization unit under which you would like to create new organization unit. You can do this by either navigating through the hierarchy tree or using the “Search” box.
After selecting the parent organization unit, click on the “+” icon in the lower right‐hand corner of the screen to add a new organization unit.
Enter organization unit details and click on “Save.”
Three attributes are required for a new organization unit: Name, Short name, and Opening date.
When creating new organization units, ensure that you are not creating duplicates by first checking to make sure that the organization unit you are about to create does not exist.
Note: The Code field is unique across the entire DATIM organization unit hierarchy, and consequently you should not use values that might conflict with others. Avoid values such as “001,” “100,” “abc,” etc. For codes, we recommend using the country’s ISO code as part of the code (e.g., US.001).
Editing an existing organization unit
Similar to the addition operation, locate the parent organization unit of the entity you want to edit, by either clicking on the organization unit or by clicking on the “Edit” option in the contextual menu (popup menu appears by clicking on the “
” icon).
Make changes in the organization unit edit form, and click on “Save” to apply the changes.
You should use edit operation to update name, shortname, code, coordinates, etc., of an organization unit. Be careful that you are not changing the organization unit conceptually by renaming it to a different entity, such as renaming “facility A” to “facility B.”
Deleting an organization unit
You can delete an organization unit only if there are no data associated with a given organization unit in DATIM. If you need to delete an organization unit, but the app will not allow it, please work with the DATIM support team.
To delete an organization unit, locate the parent organization unit to see the list of organization units contained within it, and open the contextual menu of the organization unit you want to delete by clicking on the “” icon. Click on the “Delete” menu item, and confirm your action by clicking on “CONFIRM.”
If deletion was successful, you will get a confirmation.
If deletion was not successful, you will get a message explaining why deletion did not succeed.
Hierarchy operations
The hierarchy operations module of the organization unit app allows you to move organization units to a different parent. This module is available to you in GeoAlign, but please use it with care.
Work with DATIM Support if you have any concerns or questions.
To move organization units, open the “Hierarchy operations” module.
Select the organization units you want to move in the left pane, and select the new parent organization unit in the right pane, and click on the “MOVE X ORGANISATION UNITS” button.
Make sure that the new parent is at the same level as the current one.
The move operation might take several seconds. Wait until you receive notification that the move was successful.
MoH attributes of organization units
Organization unit objects in DATIM have several MoH attributes:
- MOH ID—unique identifier of the organization unit in the MFL; could be code, as long as it is unique and the results data use this identifier for facilities
- MOH Name—organization unit name in the MFL
These attributes will be populated when you complete the facility reconciliation, and you do not need to edit them.
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