Akhona Nkwanyana

The digital era that we find ourselves living in, health data analytics has become an important tool viewed as necessary for improving patient outcomes, streamlining healthcare processes, and ensuring that decision-making is data-informed. Health data analytics or commonly known as “big data analytics in healthcare”, is considered a systematic way of analysing health data by health professionals with the objective of improving the overall management of the health system and all that comes with it (e.g. patient engagement, budgeting/costs and treatment planning). With the current growing influence of Artificial intelligence (AI), and the talks and planned rollout of the South African National Health Insurance system, it seems significant that healthcare professionals cultivate technical, analytical and ethical skills and/or competencies to navigate this ever-changing landscape.

A question seems to come up when reflecting on the above: Are health practitioners ready to embrace the power of data in healthcare?

A review is on the cusp of concluding and aims to understand what health practitioners need to be ready. Forming part of a multidisciplinary team of local and American experts, I am leading a scoping review that maps the global landscape of skills and competencies in health data analytics for health professionals. Using a rigorous, systematic, and evidence-based framework proposed by Arksey and O’Malley, the review has sifted through a decade’s (2012 to 2022) global literature to uncover the known, missing and—most importantly—  needed health data analytical skills and/or competencies.

So…why should this matter?

It matters because healthcare is no longer just about bedside manners and clinical knowledge. It’s about understanding data—big, fast, complex data—and translating it into smarter diagnoses, better illness and disease prevention and treatment, more efficient health systems, and proactive public health strategies. From hospital administrators to healthcare providers (such as doctors, nurses, community health workers, and more), professionals need a new toolkit, and this review aims to map what we know and what more is needed to be known to develop it. This review is, to my knowledge, the first of its kind to comprehensively scope literature that determined health professionals’ skills and/or competencies when it comes to data analytics, which is fast becoming essential across every level of the delivery of healthcare.

Why is this review different?

• Global relevance: It explores variations across high-, middle-, and low-income countries, giving a truly international perspective on health data competency needs.
• Impact potential: Findings can inform curriculum development, help design targeted training programmes, and influence policy on healthcare workforce development.
• Innovation-ready: The insights could fuel the creation of a comprehensive skills framework, directly feeding into the fourth Industrial Revolution in healthcare.

Conducting this review ensures that the appropriate skills and/or competencies are highlighted that equip health professionals, who may often be unprepared, with the abilities to work with digital tools, understand electronic health records/data, and apply real-time data necessary for clinical and managerial/administrative decision-making. A problem has been identified, namely that many healthcare workers, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, lack the foundational skills to navigate this data-rich environment, such as basic data interpretation. As a result of this, we could potentially see a workforce gap that could limit digital health innovations in the near future.

Our review then comes in to summarise the state of skills and/or competencies that support smart, evidence-based healthcare.

What can we then expect from the review?

• A categorised list of skills and/or competencies currently identified in the literature.
• Geographic mapping of where these skills are emphasised—or missing.
• A narrative summary of the similarities, differences, and key trends across settings.
• Recommendations for course development, policy adjustments, and investment in workforce development.

Get Ready for the Future of Healthcare

As we await the results, one thing is clear: this review could influence how we train the next generation of healthcare professionals, especially as artificial intelligence, big data, and digital health tools might become the norm rather than the exception.

A chance has been provided for this study to contribute towards knowledge that’s redefining healthcare—not just technologically, but educationally and systemically. The results will be published in a peer-reviewed journal and shared widely through conferences, webinars, and social media.

Follow the journey. Share the mission. And be among the first to dive into the findings when they’re released. Because in a world where data drives decisions, skills drive change. Because the next generation of healthcare heroes won’t just wear stethoscopes—they’ll speak the language of data.

Follow for updates, and be part of the journey to smarter, data-enabled healthcare.

Note. The headline image of this blog post was generated with the help of Microsoft Copilot using artificial intelligence. Health data analytics skills and competencies for health professionals.

Alexandra Stone

“Not a pleasing environment,” was how President Cyril Ramaphosa described the city of Johannesburg at a meeting between the National Executive and the City of Johannesburg Executive Council in Braamfontein on Thursday 6 March 2025. This meeting came two weeks after the G20 Foreign Ministers’ meeting at Nasrec Expo Centre, as the city prepares to host the G20 Summit in November. To address these concerns with the city, President Ramaphosa announced a Presidential Working Group focused on improving service delivery, managing the city’s finances and operations and facilitating economic growth. In particular, the Working Group has been tasked with rejuvenating the inner city, in an attempt to “take Johannesburg back to its glory days”. In order to positively transform Johannesburg, particularly its inner city, I believe it is necessary to understand the complex and unique history behind its formation and growth. My research aims to achieve this by using the history of pharmacy in the city as a lens through which to examine its development.

The history of pharmacy in South Africa may be likened to Johannesburg’s inner city – long neglected and underestimated. Within the canon of medical historical research in South Africa (an overview of which, published in 2008, may be found here, and later examples, here and here) two major studies have been conducted on the history of pharmacy. The first, A History of Organised Pharmacy in South Africa, 1885-1950 by Mike Ryan, was published in 1986 by the Society for the History of Pharmacy in South Africa (this was adapted from Ryan’s 1983 MA thesis). The second, Pharmacy in the Transvaal, 1894-1994 by Dorothy Goyns, was published in 1995 by the Pharmaceutical Society of South Africa. Both studies provide a broad scope and clear chronology of the development of the profession, focusing on key events and personalities. In the 30-odd years since these studies were published, the Society for the History of Pharmacy of South Africa has ceased to exist, at least in name, and in 2023 the former premises of the National Pharmacy Museum and Library at 52 Glenhove Road, Johannesburg, were sold and the collections downsized and relocated to new premises in Woodmead and Illovo.

All of this may suggest a veritable lack of interest in the history of South African pharmacy, particularly in recent years. However, the body of research on indigenous medicine, ethnobotany and the historical use and regulations of pharmaceuticals continues to grow. Additionally, historical investigations have been conducted into medical pluralism and hybridity among different racial and ethnic groups in the Witwatersrand that result in varying preferences for and consumption of herbs, home remedies and patent and proprietary medicines from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. Against this backdrop, research into the history of pharmacy in South Africa may be reframed considering this complex network of culturally informed, politically regulated (self-)medication.

Histories of pharmacy may also be considered alongside histories of public health. In the South African historical context, public health has been convincingly linked to urban planning. This connection is exemplified by Maynard Swanson’s coining of the term ‘sanitation syndrome’ to describe the role played by infection and disease in the creation of urban apartheid in South Africa. Another example of this link is the inclusion of town planning clauses in the 1919 Public Health Act and 1920 Housing Act, the passing of which was precipitated by the Spanish Flu epidemic. Considering this, the possibility of examining the changing urban landscape of Joburg alongside the growth and development of pharmacy in the city is intriguing.

Given my undergraduate background in Archaeology and Chemistry, the research for my MSc in Archaeology brings together my interests in historical Johannesburg and the history of science. My work uses pharmacists’ prescription books from the 1890s to the 1930s as an archive of spatial and demographic information on several Johannesburg pharmacies and their clientele. Further information on the spatial expansion of the pharmacy profession in the city comes from a series of fire insurance maps of Johannesburg from 1895 (updated and extended in 1910) and 1937 that plot fire risk and consequently reveal the locations of inner-city pharmacies and their relationships to surrounding businesses and infrastructure. By analysing and mapping this information, a once bustling medico-commercial network of pharmacies and clientele may be revealed.

I believe that such historical networks and interactions will be important in the reinvigoration of Joburg’s inner-city, the return to its “glory days”. President Ramaphosa’s words are interesting and encouraging, as they frame Johannesburg’s turbulent past in a positive light, something to yearn for. They recognise, hopefully, that the city’s history and urban fabric are worth preserving and highlight that Johannesburg and its people have always managed to defy regulation, subvert expectations, an adapt to new challenges – a message I hope to see conveyed on the global stage of the 2025 G20 Summit.

Note: The headline image of this post is a photograph I took of part of the pharmacy display at the Wits Adler Museum of Medicine.