African Population Studies Special Edition, 2015 1699 http://aps.journals.ac.za Accelerating and improving survey implementation with mobile technology: Lessons from PMA2020 implementation in Lagos, Nigeria Linnea Zimmerman 1,a , Funmilola OlaOlorun b , Scott Radloff a a Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, USA b College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, Nigeria Abstract Large-scale nationally representative surveys have traditionally been implemented using paper surveys, necessitating secondary steps of data entry and management after data collection. Errors occurring during data collection or entry may not be rapidly identified. The Performance Monitoring and Accountability (PMA2020 2 ) project implementation in Lagos, Nigeria demonstrates four advantages to integrating mobile technology into survey implementation. First is the rapidity of data collection; data collection lasted six weeks from mapping/listing to final collection – and, since completed surveys are uploaded to a cloud-based server, identification of errors can occur in near real-time. Second, time-stamping and GPS marking allow for improved quality assurance. Third, the inclusion of GPS coordinates creates new opportunities to analyze relationships of distance with use of health services. Fourth, PMA2014/Lagos utilized a 10% resample of households to validate data collection allowing for rapid identification of questionable data and quality control. Keywords: Survey implementation; Mobile technology; Family planning Résumé Traditionnellement, les enquêtes à grande échelle représentatives au niveau national sont effectuées en version papier, ce qui nécessite des étapes secondaires comme la saisie et la gestion de données après le recueil. Il se peut que les erreurs qui se présentent pendant la collecte ou la saisie de données ne soient pas identifiées de façon rapide. La mise en œuvre du projet « Performance Monitoring and Accountability » (PMA2020 1 ) à Lagos au Nigeria démontre quatre avantages de l’intégration de la technologie mobile dans la réalisation des enquêtes. Le 1 Corresponding author Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, USA 615 N. Wolfe Street, W4511; Baltimore, MD 21205, USA Tel: +1-410-955-2232; Email: lzimme12@jhu.edu 2 www.pma2020.org