Questions/Answers

Birth and Death System initiative, which incorporates cutting-edge technologies in the field of healthcare for the registration of Birth and Death within the country, UAE. Registration of vital events is essential for accurately calculating birth and death rates and for assessing the level of infant mortality. It also addressed the objective of mandatory registration of all birth and death happened within the country. UAE’s Ministry of Health and Prevention is the authorized body in the country to register the Birth and death within the country and authorized body in issuing the Birth or death certificate. Birth registration is the process by which a childʼs birth is recorded in the civil register by the government authority. It provides the first legal recognition of the child and is generally required for the child to obtain a birth certificate. It is important that the registered child receive a birth certificate because it provides permanent, official and visible evidence of a country’s legal recognition of his or her existence as a member of society. Birth registration enables a child to receive medical treatment, go to school and prevent child exploitation. All these rely on birth registration to prove identity and thus entitlement to basic rights. A recent study states that millions of babies across the globe are not registered at birth. Without a proper birth certificate, children may lack access to basic services like health care and education. The main issue it addressed was it ensures that no birth or death goes non-registered in this country UAE even if the birth or death happened within or outside medical facilities. Accurate information on births has been stressed as important for tracking progress towards the health-related Millennium Development Goals by the World Health Organization.

This initiative has resulted in drastic reduction of the time that it takes to process a registration process and ensured bare minimal manual intervention in processing the application. Our digital transformation journey started with process re-engineering to address the gaps and challenges. To achieve this drastic change, cutting-edge technologies like Artificial intelligence, Business Intelligence tools for analytics etc. was incorporated into the solution. Using seamless integration technology the data flows automatically from the clinical systems of MOHAP facilities to Birth and Death systems. Our customers can request for original certificates via either web channels or even native mobile applications.

This initiative is targeting the SDG Goal No: 3 and Goal No: 11. By these initiative we are simply aiming to drastically reduce the infant mortality rate and also ensure that no registration of birth and death goes missing. It also aims to significantly reduce the number of deaths and the number of people affected and substantially decrease the direct economic losses. This ensures a healthy nation and increases the happiness of the people of this country. All these monitoring and tracking ensures healthy life and promotes well-being for all at all the ages. Healthy life makes a health community. Regular national level awareness campaigns are organized by Ministry of Health and Prevention to educate the importance of Birth Certificate and initial vaccinations for child. In case of no birth certificate, the child will not be able to get proper health-care facilities and maybe exposed to harmful & dangerous diseases in the absence of proper vaccination. Registration of both birth and death is also vital for national planning. Registration of births and deaths are necessary for countries to compile accurate and timely vital statistics which helps in population census. Cause of death data are also useful to inform governments about outbreaks of fatal disease.

A nation with healthy people will always have a huge positive impact on the economic and social growth of the country. Healthy people leads to healthy nation and leads to big boost in the economic situation of the country. The economic growth of the nation will improve the overall life expectancy and other health indicators. Registration of births and deaths is necessary for countries to compile accurate and timely vital statistics which helps in population census. These statistics assist local authorities to decide how much and what type of essential services to provide. Adopting paper-less strategy positively impacts the environment.

This initiate has resulted in 100% achievement of all birth and death registration within the country. This initiative means that today the UAE ranks as the first country in the Middle East region to make all birth within medical facilities to be registered and provide mandatory vaccinations to all babies. The transformation efforts have created a very transparent process for birth and death registration that is a model for other regulatory agencies. The process has become very simple and easily manageable for the individuals and hospitals. This greater transparency and less burdens positively contributed to the UAE's healthy culture and its boosted the confidence of residents and citizens in the country. A well-functioning birth registration system also helps governments plan, budget, and monitor their population accurately. It also ensures that we are fully aligned with paperless strategy thereby saving the environment from cutting down trees. This initiative resulted in national planning and the civil registration records of births and deaths are necessary for countries to compile accurate, complete and timely vital statistics, which, along with population censuses, are central to estimating population size. This initiative assisted local authorities in deciding how much and what type of essential services to provide.

This initiative is targeting the concept of Health for all irrespective of the gender. This initiative addressed the gender inequality in the country UAE, by making the registration of all birth and death a mandatory process to avail any basic services. Birth registration is the basis for advancing gender equality and children’s rights. Affordable and always accessible healthcare and medicines for the citizen and the residents of this country of all gender and ages leads to the happy and healthy people.

Birth registration initiative target group is all children born in this country. The registration of birth is mandatory for all birth occurred and also mandatory vaccinations for kids which prevents them from being exposed to harmful & dangerous diseases in the absence of proper vaccination. Death registration initiative target group is the deceased person. The registration of death is also mandatory with reason of death and actual cause of death. Both these registration assist for national level planning. The civil registration records of births and deaths are necessary for countries to compile accurate, complete and timely vital statistics, which, along with population censuses, are central to estimating population size. By knowing the size and composition of the local population, the local authorities decide how much and what type of essential services to provide to the public. The cause of death data from civil registration systems are vital for pinpointing the diseases and injuries that are cutting lives short and for planning preventive services to avoid premature mortality. Cause of death data are also useful to inform governments about outbreaks of fatal disease.

A fully manual services which includes bunch of papers as part of the applications was really a cumbersome process to the nation and to the residents. Hence we started the automation process. Automation and technology put together in proper use has brought about revolution in the field, ensuring ease and quick turn around time for the public at large. A well-functioning birth and death registration system also helps governments plan, budget, and monitor their population accurately. 1. Process Re-engineering: This is the first exercise done to reduce the service provisioning timeline. All unwanted steps are omitted and reduced the customer touch points. 2. Customer Experience Session: organized multiple customer experience session to understand the requirement of the real customers. 3. Development: This initiate moved into the development stage. 4. Testing and Training: Full fledged testing was carried out to make sure its error free. A detailed training to all stake holders were organized to introduce the automated solution. By Fully automating of process, we have saved on an average 18 papers per applications as all were digitized and thus ensuring a paper-less strategy implementation. The actual cause of death is analyzed by relevant authorities to plan for healthy activities among the public

The major obstacles faced during the implementation was educating the importance of registration within some sectors of people staying in remote areas. This change in culture was the major challenge faced. Regular awareness campaigns is done and ensured that 100% birth and death is registered in the system. To achieve this our registration system is implemented as a simplified solution and with very affordable fees. Thus by fully automating the service, the manual process was fully digitized. This ensured that lead time for a registration drastically reduced with zero number of papers.

The transformational efforts by Ministry of Health and Prevention have created an easy and transparent process for registration of birth and death within the national level. The new process has achieved 100% customer satisfaction. Automation and technology put to proper use has brought about a revolution in the field, ensuring ease and quick turn around time for the public at large. The solution is utilizing all innovative technologies to make it 100% free of human intervention and integrated with many Governmental and Non-Governmental bodies in real time.

This innovative initiative means that today UAE ranks as the first country in the Middle East region to have a full fledged system which automates the complete process where all birth and death is registered and the issuance of certificates. The turnaround time has reduced from few days to few hours by implementing innovative technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI), Business Intelligence (BI) and Block-chain . Utilizing all these technologies have created a very transparent process. This transparency and fewer burdens has contributed to the UAE's competitiveness and attractiveness for continued investment and innovation in this medial sector.

Our full-fledged automated process of registering of birth and death process initiative stands on top of all as we have seamless process from the start till the end of issuing the certificate. Our initiative is being used across the country and in all cities and emirates. The system is robust and powerful to handle the huge number of transactions. Other countries are referring to our initiate to enhance their systems to meet the growing demands. Our system is accessible via multiple channels such as Web, mobile devices, native mobile apps etc. thus ensuring that individuals access the system via omni channels. Our initiative has been adapted to national level. This ensures a centralized database of all birth and death occurred in the country. We are the custodian of the national unified birth and death database. More over we keep other international bodies such as World Health Organization (WHO) informed about the statistics of birth and death including the actual cause of death.

Already adapted.

This initiatives includes both financial and human resources for the implementation. There are multiple roles in the system such as: 1. Hospital User 2. Manager 3. Physician 4. Back office 5. Admin Other resources include clinical systems such as Cerner etc. The solution is seamlessly integrated with these clinical systems to exchange the data between both in order to ensure no human intervention and thereby avoid error.

Over time this initiative ensures health for all and healthy life which ultimately leads to the healthy nation. A well-functioning birth registration system also helps governments plan, budget, and monitor their population accurately. Birth registration enables governments to plan for the delivery of health services, including pre and post-natal care, and to design social and educational programs that meet the needs of mothers and their children.

Yes

This was evaluated by a qualified professional company named 'IQVIA'. It did a thorough study to analyze the impact of this initiative on the UAE economy, environment and the community. The study shows optimization of costs, limiting carbon footprints and an aware and happy staff & applicant. The study also did a comparative between the manual and automated processes describe the impact of the change.

Multiple sources have been leveraged including IQVIA proprietary data assets as well as secondary data sources and primary market research. The organization followed a three phased approach to investigate high level access dynamics and analyse timings for agreed metrics in selected countries. The analysis was based on data analysis, interviews and secondary market research. Phase 1: Project Set up Phase 2: Interviews of applicants and MOHAP employees. Phase 3: Analysis and Reporting

1. The study shows optimization of costs, limiting carbon footprints and happy staff & applicant. 2. Optimized Operational Cost: 2.1. Technology and machines replaced much of the work that was done by the hand pre-automation. According to the studies, average cost savings may reach of up to 30 percent within five years. 2.2. Reduced cost related to storage of files and maintenance, cost per staff head count per service and cost related to paper printing (paper and ink) 3. Increased Productivity: 3.1. The automation enabled increased productivity by processing a higher number of applications per day and within a defined period 3.2. Optimized utilization of staff time: The distribution of staff’s time is properly planned enabling the team to conduct additional tasks and activities within the working hours. 4. The automation of services showed reduction in Carbon Footprints, contributing to the preserving of environment 4.1.With the automated services the level of gas and fuel consumption was reduced and thus limiting air pollution. 4.2. Limited consumption of manufactured papers and thus saving of trees. During the year 2018, 94 trees were saved due to the automation of services where 94,000 papers were saved (In average 1 tree = 10,000 sheets).

Birth and Death Registration and Certification solution is tightly integrated with many Government agencies such as the below: 1. Ministry of Interior 2. Federal Authority of Identity and Citizenship 3. Telecom Regulatory Authority 4. Ministry of Finance (E-Dirham) 5. Health Authority of Abudhabi 6. General Pension Authority All these above integrations are real time integrations with bi-directional communication to exchange the data. Any notification received for Birth and Death from Hospital or Regulatory agency will be pushed to different Government sources for further processing of the data. For example: the General Pension Authority once receives the death notification will stop the pension payment automatically. Apart from the above integrations with Government agencies, there are many other integrations with the solution such as to improve the system performances and enhances the system features.: 1. Cerner Millennium 2. Enterprise SMS Solution 3. Exchange All the above integrations lead to a fully automated solution where automation and technology put to proper use has brought about a revolution in the field, ensuring ease and quick turn-around time for the public at large.

Birth and Death Registration and certification initiative involves various stakeholders such as 1. Ministry of Interior 2. Federal Authority of Identity and Citizenship 3. TRA 4. Ministry of Finance (E-Dirham) 5. General Pension Authority The customer journey was charted and designed with approval from all stake holders. The integration documents which comprises of the mapping, data design was prepared and agreed. All the above stakeholders were part of the designing phase and implementing phase. As part of the agreement with World Health Organization (WHO) the data from the Birth and Death Registration System is successfully published to the organization which comprises of all data such as Baby Birth weight, gender etc. In case of death the data such as Actual cause of death, leading cause of death, ICD mortality codes etc. is submitted to WHO.

Key issue learned was low levels of awareness in certain communities was an obstacle to 100% birth registration in the beginning. But the regular awareness session increased the awareness of these communities and thereby we have achieved 100% registration in both birth and death solution. A well-functioning birth registration system also helps governments plan, budget, and monitor their population accurately and considering the importance of Birth and death certificate, the registration and certificate issuance system should be top-notch and keeps on improving the solution. Our future plans includes the below: 1. Progress towards universal birth registration. 2. Removing all the legal barriers in the registration system. 3. International level public block chain technologies interconnecting all Authorized bodies to share the birth and death registrations.