Practice Investing in health information management: The right people, in the right place, at the right time Olusesan Ayodeji Makinde, MBBS, MSc, MS 1,2,3 , Mohammed Ibrahim Mami, HND, BSc 4 , Benson Macaulay Oweghoro, HND, BSc, MSc 4,5 , Kolawole Azeez Oyediran, BSc, MSc, PhD 6 , Stephanie Mullen, DrPH 6 Abstract Aim: To describe the process adopted to review the academic curriculum for training health information management professionals in Nigeria. Context: Health information management professionals are responsible for managing patients’ health service records and hospital information systems across health facilities in Nigeria. An assessment found many are inadequately skilled in information and communications technology (ICT) skills believed to be needed for them to play leadership roles in hospital information systems and function effectively. This was traced to a dearth of relevant ICT courses in their academic training curriculum. Case study: A review of the curriculum for training health information management professionals was instituted following an agreed need to address these issues. Lessons learned: Health records management is evolving across the world including the developing countries. This advancement requires evo- lution of training programs to meet the increasing application of ICT in this sector. Conclusion: After several sessions, a new curriculum that addresses all the identified educational deficiencies has been developed. It is believed that this step will help improve the quality of training programs. Keywords (MeSH) curriculum; education; health care; health information management; health information systems; human resources; quality assurance In this article the term ‘‘program’’ refers to a discipline or tenured training period entered into by a student, while a ‘‘course’’ refers to a single subject or unit offered for credit within a particular program. Introduction An inadequately skilled health workforce has been identi- fied as one of the factors contributing to poor health out- comes in low- and middle-income countries, including Nigeria (Africa Health Workforce Observatory, 2008; Frenk et al., 2010). While the spotlight has been on medical and nursing personnel, evaluation of the performance of the health system as a whole goes beyond this level of health workers (Whittaker et al., 2015). Routine health records generated at health facilities are significant for evaluating the performance of health systems and for directing efforts towards areas of most need (Aqil et al., 2009). The primary officers responsible for the management of health records and generating statistics in health facilities are known as health information management professionals. Thus, the skills of these professionals, who are the gatekeepers for health records that are necessary to assess the performance of the health system, need to be adequate and appropriate to meet the need for high-quality data. The need to address poor health systems through intersectoral collaboration and improvement of health data stewardship across job 1 Viable Knowledge Masters, Nigeria 2 MEASURE Evaluation/John Snow Inc., Nigeria 3 Demography and Population Studies Program, Schools of Public Health and Social Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa 4 Health Records Officers Registration Board of Nigeria, Abuja, Nigeria 5 Department of Library, Archives and Information Management, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria 6 MEASURE Evaluation/ John Snow Inc. Arlington, USA Accepted for publication November 11, 2015. Corresponding author: Olusesan Ayodeji Makinde, Viable Knowledge Masters, 22 Olusegun Obasanjo Street, Peace Court Estate, Lokogoma, Abuja, Nigeria. Email: sesmak@gmail.com Health Information Management Journal 1–7 ª The Author(s) 2016 Reprints and permission: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1833358316639447 himj.sagepub.com