Table 1.

Examples of ways mobile phone surveys can contribute to noncommunicable disease (NCD) policy formulation, monitoring implementation, and evaluation (based on authors’ assessments and expectations).

Topic or issue	Examples of information needed for policy and program management	Potential contribution from using MPSa (high, medium, low)
		Formulation	Monitoring	Evaluation
Service delivery and utilization	Services most needed at the community level; groups most affected by different risk factors; where people seek care for NCDb-related services; frequency of contact between providers and users	High	High	High
Equity	Whether service delivery is equitable; who is being reached with interventions or not?	High	High	High
NCD care benefit packages	Informing selection, for example, priority target groups to benefit from NCD-related services and financial subsidies; tracking achievements of targets; assessing household care utilization; and economic implications	Low	Medium	High
Public-private partnership	NCD-related services being accessed through the public or private sector; effectiveness of contracted providers in reaching beneficiaries	High	Medium	High
Continuity of care	Coverage of continued care in the community, for example, people with hypertension who have their blood pressure monitored close to where they live	Low	High	High
Access to essential medications	Access to medications close to where people live	High	High	High
Behavior change efforts	Source and uptake of behavior change communication messages; role of incentives and disincentives to facilitate healthy behavior, for example, increasing physical activity	Medium	High	High
Fairness in financial contribution and financial risk protection	Public spending and subsidies aimed at the poor—if reaching the intended beneficiaries and preventing catastrophic medical expenditure; costs of seeking care for NCD-related conditions and source of payments	Low	High	High
Health system responsiveness	Whether services are responsive to people’s expectations, user-satisfaction with existing NCD services	Medium	High	High
Health management information systems	Triangulating data from routine facility-based information systems with population-level data, for example, on characteristics of service users	Low	Medium	High
Universal health coverage	Coverage of the population in scope and reach of NCDb services	Low	High	Low
Pharmaceutical policies related to NCDs	Drugs to allow for use at community level; how to monitor safe use; rational drug use	Low	Medium	High

^aMPS: mobile phone surveys.

^bNCD: noncommunicable disease.