Acting on Data

On April 4, 2019, the Indonesian Ministry of National Development Planning, known as Bappenas, and the Ministry of Health unveiled findings from a new provincial-level study of burden of disease, which they are using to guide national planning and priority setting.

We use more 90,000 data sources in the Global Burden of Disease. Why do we use estimates instead of simply presenting the data points?

In Rwanda, IHME’s collaborators are using GBD data as they tackle the growing burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and improve care for people living with disabilities.

In Ethiopia the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study is being used to support the Ministry of Health’s drive to strengthen evidence-based decision-making, in collaboration with key partners.

During his recent visit to IHME’s offices, we sat down with Dr. Yohannes Kinfu, member of the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study’s Scientific Council and the person who came up with the idea that led to the creation of the Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a new metric for measuring development. SDI allows people to compare countries’ health outcomes and the performance of health systems, and better understand what tomorrow’s health landscape will look like. 

The Ministry of Health of Ghana is using burden of disease data to identify the biggest health problems in the country and guide health planning.

The deadline for nominations for the 2017 Roux Prize – January 31, 2017 – is approaching quickly. To provide inspiration, we are revisiting the story of last year’s winner, Dr. John Q. Wong. Dr. Wong used burden of disease data to help the country’s government insurance program expand coverage to 15 million people most in need and reduce their out-of-pocket costs for health care.

In Mexico, evidence from the Global Burden of Disease study plays a central role in guiding health policy. As Secretary of Health of Mexico from 2000 to 2006, Dr. Julio Frenk was the first leader in the country to use Global Burden of Disease (GBD) findings to guide health policy. Burden of Disease research helped shape the package of health services provided to all Mexicans.

With its recently unveiled 2016-2020 strategic plan, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is aiming to replicate this success for other diseases that cause the most early death and disability in the US and worldwide. One of the factors the NIH will consider when determining how to best direct public resources is burden of disease data, which allow decision-makers to directly compare the impact of diseases that kill, such as cancer, and conditions that disable, such as depression. The use of burden of disease data will harmonize decision-making across the agency’s nearly 30 institutes and centers. By working with its partners – including the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation – the NIH will collect and integrate high-quality burden of disease data into its priority-setting processes.

Many of India’s 29 states are larger than most of the world’s countries. Uttar Pradesh alone, for example, has as many people as Brazil: 200 million. But this country within a country can be hidden by the other 1 billion people in India. That means that the health challenges of different parts of India can be hidden by the overall health trends at the national level.

Rodrigo Guerrero, the mayor of Cali, Colombia, was the inaugural winner of the Roux Prize in 2014. IHME’s Director of Communications, William Heisel, asked him about the work that led to his nomination, what the prize meant to him, and his hopes for how the Roux Prize might spur more evidence-based decision-making in the future.