IN support of Kalusugan Pangkalahatan, the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) launches the first of its ‘Crowdsourcing for Health’ initiatives using GoogleMaps. Determined to maximize the benefits of the social networking platform, PhilHealth is encouraging the online crowd to help map all health facilities in the Philippines.
"Recognizing the strong presence of Filipinos on the Internet, PhilHealth hopes to gather their support to pin all health facilities on an online map. PhilHealth will then display data over the facilities to better inform the public about available services in those facilities as committed to the Corporation. A more informed and empowered public, we believe, is the key to the improvement of health services," says Dr Eduardo P. Banzon, president and CEO of PhilHealth.
Leveraging the free services of Google Map Maker, PhilHealth invites the Filipino community to start pinning both public and private health facilities on the online map. The health facilities would range from hospitals, birthing homes or lying-in centers, private medical clinics, government health centers, dialysis centers, pharmacies, laboratories, and blood banks. Other health facilities can also be added.
"If you can't pin the health facility on Google, you can opt to use the open source-based OpenStreetMap.org. Our goal is to encourage our countrymen to join the race to universal health coverage. You don/t have to be a health professional. All you need is a desire to join the "bayanihan" effort," says Dr. Alvin Marcelo, PhilHealth's chief information officer.
Interested crowd-sourcers are encouraged to pin as many health facilities as they can using Google MapMaker at www.google.com/mapmaker or OpenStreetMap at www.openstreetmap.org. PhilHealth will display a summary of the health facilities at the map on its official website, www.philhealth.gov.ph under Online Services. (END)
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