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Background: Routine family planning data in South Africa are managed using a routine health information system, which facilitates data collection, storage, processing, presentation and dissemination. Healthcare providers generate data daily as they carry out their duties. The information generated should be used for planning and evaluating health program performance and policy development., Objective: To explore the use of family planning information by primary healthcare (PHC) clinic managers in South Africa., Method: A qualitative descriptive exploratory study was carried out in 11 PHC clinics in Tshwane District. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 clinic managers. The data were analysed using a thematic analysis approach., Results: Managers used the information to disseminate performance and feedback, monitor the program's performance and make decisions to improve the family planning service. However, they experienced challenges that hampered the effective use of the information., Conclusion: The use of family planning information is critical for improving the performance of the program. The clinics need sufficient skilled healthcare providers who are able to provide comprehensive family planning and generate accurate and reliable information that can be used to improve the service. Collaboration between the private and public sectors is critical in monitoring the program's performance., Competing Interests: Declaration of conflicting interestsThe author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Community Health Workers (CHW) perform important healthcare and health promotion in many low and middle income countries. They are increasingly supported in their work by the use of mHealth. This study aims to explore how mHealth services can support the everyday work for CHWs when delivering home care in rural areas in South Africa. A single case study was performed, mapping CHWs workflow and investigating where and when CHW can be supported by mHealth services. Despite the very positive feedback from the CHWs and the fact that the studied mHealth solutions appears to support the majority of the important activities in the CHWs work process, the application is no longer in use. Financial and strategic decisions are behind the discontinuation of the project, further stressing the importance of taking all socio-technical dimensions into account when evaluating success or failure of implementation projects.

Community health workers, led by trained nurses who are linked to a health facility are well positioned to play an important role in improving health of the communities in low and middle-income countries. The South African Department of Health has implemented various mobile health programmes to improve community-based services. This paper presents a component of a study that evaluates mHealth interventions in South Africa. The study was conducted in Pretoria urban and semi-urban areas, with the aim of understanding how community health workers experience mHealth technologies. Three focus group interviews were conducted and data analysis followed Thorne Interpretive Description framework. An overarching theme was that the mHealth application provided clinical content that empowered community health workers to develop confidence, higher efficacy, independent decisions making and experience higher social standing with their clients. This in turn, translated into informed clients. There is evidence of strengthened capacity in the use of mHealth technology and application of knowledge to provide an engaged client care. Functionalities in the application allowed timely exchange of information and decision support.