The Ghana Health Service (GHS) has called for the effective use of community feedback to improve healthcare delivery and strengthen accountability within the health system. 

Dr Samuel K. Boakye-Boateng, Director of the Policy, Planning, Monitoring, and Evaluation Division of the GHS, said the Community Scorecard should serve as a pathway from community experience to evidence and, ultimately, action. 

He said the initiative, developed in 2018 by the Ministry of Health and the GHS with support from the African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA), provided a structured platform for communities and health service providers to assess services, identify challenges and agree on practical measures to address them. 

Dr Boakye-Boateng was speaking at an engagement on the Community Scorecard Project in Ghana involving the African Media and Malaria Research Network (AMMREN), health officials, development partners, and media practitioners. 

He said the scorecard enabled communities at the Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) level to assess health services quarterly across nine indicators and develop Community Health Action Plans with clearly defined responsibilities. 

He said the scores and action plans were recorded on the District Health Information Management System (DHIMS2) and the Community Scorecard web platform to facilitate monitoring and follow-up. 

Dr Boakye-Boateng said the initiative was designed to complement routine health data by capturing clients' experiences, including whether they were treated with respect, whether waiting times were reasonable, and whether medicines, diagnostic services, and accessible, clean, and safe facilities were available. 

“The value of a scorecard lies not in the colour of an indicator, but in what happens after the scoring session,” he said. 

He urged health managers to examine the reasons behind red or yellow indicators and determine what could be addressed at the facility, district, regional, or national levels. 

He said Community Health Action Plans were therefore critical because they connected identified concerns to specific responses that could be monitored and reviewed. 

Dr Boakye-Boateng noted that communities had, in some instances, mobilised resources to improve infrastructure and waste management, while local health teams had responded to concerns regarding access to services. 

He said a recent review by the Project Steering Committee identified progress as well as challenges relating to coordination, stakeholder engagement, follow-up of agreed actions, and sustainability. 

“Collecting scorecard information is only the beginning. The real value lies in how the evidence is used,” he said. 

The GHS Director said the Service's ambition was to make community feedback a routine component of health service management rather than a stand-alone project, with the findings incorporated into planning, supervision, performance reviews and resource allocation. 

He urged health workers and managers at the facility, district, regional and national levels to treat community feedback as everyone's responsibility and use it to identify areas requiring improvement. 

Dr Boakye-Boateng also called on journalists to play an active role in strengthening accountability by amplifying community voices, following up on commitments, verifying evidence and reporting both challenges and improvements. 

He urged journalists not to treat scorecard findings as verdicts against individual health workers or institutions but as starting points for problem-solving. 

“Ask what the community experienced, what explanation the facility has provided, what action was agreed upon, who is responsible, and what has changed,” he said. 

He said the GHS was committed to engaging openly with the media, providing information and clarification, sharing evidence, explaining challenges, and reporting progress. 

Dr Boakye-Boateng said three questions should guide stakeholders when reviewing scorecard findings: “What are communities telling us? What does the evidence require us to do differently? And how can we use that evidence to influence decisions and mobilise the support required?” 

He said consistently moving from community voice to evidence, action and feedback would help strengthen trust in the health system and contribute to people-centred care and the attainment of universal health coverage. 

He reaffirmed the GHS's commitment to working with communities, AMMREN, ALMA, Hope for Future Generations (HFFG), WAPCAS, L'Initiative through Expertise France, and regional and district health directorates to strengthen social accountability in healthcare delivery.