The Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C–DAC), Pune, has developed a mobile–based application to help generate instant status reports on dengue, which has become a major health challenge in the city.

The tool enables decision makers to detect changes in trend and distribution of dengue in order to initiate investigative and control measures. It also serves as an official measure to gauge the effectiveness of anti–dengue and other disease prevention programmes.

"This makes the application highly effective for dengue prevention and control," Associate Director and HoD, Knowledge Discovery and Analytics Group (KDAG) of C–DAC, Dr Medha Dhurandhar said.

The application named Mobile–based Surveillance Quest using IT (MoSQuIT) was developed by C–DAC Pune. It acts effectively to reduce the time–duration of providing treatment as the data reporting is carried out in real time by the local field worker without having to physically travel to the nearest health centre.

"Under this system, local health workers collect data through MoSQuIT on a mobile phone. This data is then transferred to a laboratory for testing through e–mail or SMS. The lab technician then transfers the generated result back to the health worker using MoSQuIT. This enables quick data analysis by the Indian Council of Medical Research for intervention programmes," the Principal Technical Officer of C–DAC, Lakshmi Panat said.

The State surveillance officer, Dr Pradeep Awate, said that the Health Department is using such tools for various surveillance programmes. "Tools like these are always welcome as it strengthens public health programmes," Dr Awate said.