Each health tool loads worked program examples, from vaccination and screening to hotlines, and also business cases such as workplace wellness, insurance and customer research, because the same methods apply.
1Public health and systems
Systems work makes a service reach everyone it should: enough coverage, enough staff, and data you can trust. It is unglamorous, and it decides whether a good program works at scale.
What the team should look after
- Program manager: coverage against target, and the daily pace needed to close the gap.
- Operations lead: staffing for hotlines, clinics and outreach, sized to peak demand.
- Monitoring and evaluation: surveys sized properly, with design effect and non-response built in.
What usually goes wrong
- A coverage target with no daily run-rate behind it.
- Staffing to average demand, so the peak hour fails.
- A survey too small to show the change you are paying for.
The tools, in working order
- Coverage gap plannerVaccination, screening or enrollment: how many people you still need to reach, per day.
- Renewal outreach plannerWho could lapse over paperwork at renewal, how many outreach keeps, and the outreach workers it takes.
- Hotline staffing calculatorHow many agents a health hotline or call center needs to answer calls fast (Erlang C).
- Staff turnover cost calculatorWhat each leaver costs in empty days, hiring, training and ramp-up, the yearly bill and what a one-point cut saves.
- Survey sample size calculatorHow many people to survey, with finite population, design effect and non-response built in.
Where I did this
With SureCash I helped deliver a government stipend to about 10 million beneficiaries, recognized with a Banking Fair Award of Excellence.
Read the case: Delivering a government stipend to 10 million beneficiaries →2Population health
Population health asks what a program is worth across a whole population: how many cases it prevents, what it saves, and how to explain the effect honestly to the public and to funders.
What the team should look after
- Program lead: effect sizes from good evidence, and realistic take-up.
- Health economist or finance: cost per case prevented, and the break-even effect.
- Communications: risk in absolute numbers, not only percentages.
What usually goes wrong
- Assuming everyone takes part.
- Counting treatment costs only, which undersells prevention.
- “50% lower risk” with no baseline, which misleads in both directions.
The tools, in working order
- Prevention ROI calculatorCases prevented, costs averted, ROI and cost per case prevented for a prevention program.
- Risk communication calculatorTurn relative risk into absolute risk, number needed to treat and an "out of 100" picture.
- Herd immunity gap calculatorThe vaccination coverage a disease needs, your gap, how many each case infects and the catch-up doses to close it.
- Outbreak surge plannerBeds and nurses needed at the peak, and the date your beds run out, from cases a day and doubling time.
Where I did this
Through Praava Health’s partnership with Lifebuoy, we took health access to population scale, with about 3,000 calls a day.
Read the case: Population-scale access via the Lifebuoy partnership →3Health communication
Health communication turns evidence into action people actually take. It needs a clear objective, words people understand, a reason to take part, and a way to measure the change from message to behavior.
What the team should look after
- Health educator: SMART objectives tied to a behavior, not only awareness.
- Writer or content lead: a 6th to 8th grade reading level, with the jargon removed.
- Strategist: the insight and the value exchange: why would people bother?
- Evaluator: measures from exposure through to behavior change.
What usually goes wrong
- Objectives that count activity (posts, leaflets) instead of change.
- Messages written for colleagues, not for the audience.
- No baseline, so success cannot be shown.
The tools, in working order
- Health message readability checkerReading grade, jargon to replace and sentences to split, for leaflets, SMS and posts.
- SMART objective builderWrite a specific, measurable, time-bound objective for a health program or campaign.
Borrowed from the growth system
Campaign planning tools work the same way for health campaigns.
- Consumer insight statement builderTurn an observation into a usable insight with the human tension inside it.
- Value exchange checkerWill people take part? Weigh what you ask of them against what they get back.
- Customer journey mapperFrom trigger to repeat purchase: map each stage, its barrier, and find the biggest leak.
- Creative brief builderA one-page creative brief with a single-minded proposition, ready to copy or print.
- Campaign measurement plan builderLink communication, attitude, behavior and business effects with the right measures.
Where I did this
I ran a year-long campus harm-reduction campaign that was segmented by audience and evaluated from start to finish.
Read the case: Campus harm-reduction campaign: segmented, evaluated prevention →Get new free tools by email. One short note when a new tool or essay goes live. No spam, unsubscribe any time.
Planning a health program or campaign?
I am a CHES®-certified health education specialist with an MPH and 17 years of public-health and behaviour-change work in the US and Bangladesh. A 30-minute call is free.
Questions
Who are these tools for?
Program managers, health educators, monitoring and evaluation teams, health communicators, and anyone running a health service or campaign, in government, NGOs, health systems or companies.
Are the examples real?
Effect sizes in the prevention examples come from published trials and reviews, cited on each tool. Other numbers are illustrative: replace them with your own data.
Is anything I type stored?
No. Every tool runs in your browser. Nothing you type is sent or stored.