Leveraging Information Technology to Bridge the Health Workforce Gap

CapacityPlus’s Dykki Settle contributed to this “Perspectives” feature in the special issue of the Bulletin of the World Health Organization published in conjunction with the Third Global Forum on Human Resources for Health. The article emphasizes the potential for leveraging recent investments in information technology infrastructure along with innovations in eHealth, mHealth, and social media in addressing global health workforce challenges. Ten recommendations are offered for training, empowering, and supporting health workers in resource-limited settings through the use of information and communication technologies (ICT). The authors conclude that “the ICT ‘train’ has left the station. It remains to be seen whether the global health workforce will ride along or remain behind.”