Romain-Rolland F Tohouri

Fairfax VA
USA

SUMMARY
Digital health leader with 15+ years of international development experience across Africa, the United States, and the Caribbean. Skilled in health information systems strengthening, digital health strategy development, institutional capacity building, systems interoperability, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity. Extensive expertise in managing the deployment and enhancement of open source-based health information, logistics, and electronic health record systems at the national level across eight countries. Proven ability to develop and implement innovative digital health solutions while fostering mentorship, multi-stakeholder collaboration, and delivering sustainable, impactful results. Strong communication, teamwork, and project management skills.

SKILLS

• Public Health Projects/Programs Leadership and Management
• Health Information Systems Development and Information System Security
• Digital Health Strategy Development and Stakeholder Engagement and Collaboration
• AI and Local LLM (Large Language Models) Integration
• DevOps Engineering / DHIS2 (District Health Information Software 2) and other open soucre health information systems deployment and dptimization
• Capacity Building and Knowledge Transfer
• Advanced Data Analysis and Visualization

EMPLOYMENT HISTORY

Board Director
HISP Côte d’Ivoire | Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire| 01/2015 — Present (Turnover ~ $600,000 -$1,000,000)

• Leading national health system strengthening efforts in Côte d’Ivoire.

• Providing leadership and guidance to Côte d’Ivoire’s Ministry of Health (MOH).
• Managing HISP-CI (Health Information System Program Cote d’Ivoire) teams and operations.
• Overseeing Global Fund-funded digital health activities for the MOH.

Manager and Lead DevOps Engineer
YaLIM LLC (yalim.org) | Fairfax, Virginia 09/01/2022 — Present

• Implemented high availability clusters and CI/CD (Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery) pipelines.

• Deployed a Talos Linux based high availability production-grade cluster using Kubernetes, hosting 7 scalable routine health information systems (HIS) and a national disease surveillance information systems in the cloud and on premise
• Developed and deployed the “YaLIM cloud” software as service electronic platform (yalim.cloud or dhis2.cloud)
• Created AI-powered DHIS2 bulletins and dashboards for efficient health information sharing.

Lead Architect
MOMENTUM Knowledge Accelerator (MKA) | Arlington, VA | 01/2022 — 05/2025 ($30-million USAID cooperative agreement)

• Designed system architecture for collecting and managing MOMENTUM awards data

• Supported Momentum awards and MKA (MOMENTUM KNOWLEDGE ACCELERATOR) Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) teams
• Led the design and implementation of the integrated MKA Information system architecture integrating heterogeneous external systems using an interoperability layer
• Implemented data quality assurance processes and streamlined data analysis workflows

Senior HIS Advisor
JSI at Center for Digital Health| Arlington, VA | 01/2019 — 02/2025

• Managed DHIS2 and Developer Groups for JSI (John Snow Inc.) projects

• Implemented JSI Head Quarter ECHO DHIS2 platform
• Led Burkina Faso CHISU ($200 million USAID’s flagship data and information system project, designed to strengthen health information systems in low- and middle-income countries) team in One Health System implementation
• Assisted Niger in conducting ICT (Information Communication and Technology) Infrastructure assessment
• Led Niger’s National Digital Health blueprint and National interoperability standard documents development and supported establishment of the national digital health steering committee
• Assessed Haiti national health information servers security posture against CIS benchmarks and various security standards such as NIST 800-53 (The US National Institute of Standards and Technology cybersecurity standard) and GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)

Health Information Systems Advisor
StopSpillover Project | Arlington, VA |01/2020 — 12/2023
$100 million USAID Project - Created the One Health Information Assessment Tool (OHIAT) and the Readiness Assessment Tool for One Health (RATHO)

• Facilitated Liberia’s strategic planning for a One Health information system at the human-animal interface
• Conducted training sessions on the usage of developed tools
• Collaborated with stakeholders to ensure effective implementation
• Enhanced data collection and analysis processes for improved decision-making

Country Activity Lead
MEASURE Evaluation| Arlington, VA | 01/2015 — 12/2019
$231.9 million USAID cooperative agreement - Led MEASURE Evaluation Project activities in Liberia, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Guinea, Mali, Ghana, Madagascar, Ethiopia, and Côte d’Ivoire

• Strengthened malaria control programs in Cameroon and disease surveillance in Burkina Faso
• Provided technical support for DHIS2 implementation in Guinea and Madagascar
• Supported interoperability of health systems in Côte d’Ivoire and Mali
• Developed a system for monitoring HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) patients in Ghana using DHIS2 Tracker module
• Supported the development of the Liberian Ministry of Health’s strategic plan
• Assessment of the ICT infrastructure of the Liberian health system and design of the national HIS Enterprise Architecture

Digital Health Transformation Consultant

• Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire | 01/2013 — 12/2014

• Conducted water and sanitation points census using Akvo Flow app in Benin
• Led community-based health information system assessment in Mali using PRISM assessment tool

• Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Sierra-leone, Mali | 2008 — 2014

• WHO consultant for HMN framework assessment in Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Sierra-leone, Mali
• University of Oslo consultant for DHIS2 deployment at national level in Sierra-Leone, Burkina Faso and Cote d’Ivoire

EDUCATION
Higher University Diploma in ICT for development, Project Management option, University of Limoges | Limoges, France
Doctorate in Medicine |University of Bamako |Bamako, Haiti

PUBLICATIONS
Full list of publications available upon request.

PUBLICATIONS

• Romain-Rolland Tohouri, “One Health Information Assessment Tool (OHIAT), Africa digital health Summit 2024 - ADHS2024/066
• Romain Tohouri, “A Standardized approach to national Health Information System Strengthening is the key to successful implementation”, MEASURE Evaluation 2018, Guinea
• Mohamed Rahim Kebe, Cyrille Kouassi, Issaka Sawadogo, Romain-Rolland Tohouri, Jeanne Chauffour “The One Health Electronic Platform in Burkina Faso”, GDHF 20019, Washington, D.C. USA
• Mohamed Rahim Kebe, Cyrille Kouassi, Issaka Sawadogo, Romain-Rolland Tohouri, Jeanne Chauffour “The One Health Electronic Platform in Burkina Faso”
• Johan Saebø, Edem Kossi, Ola Hodne Titlestad, Romain-Rolland Tohouri, Jørn Braa “Integrating Health Information System in Sierra Leone”; ICTD 2009, Doha, Qatar.
• Edem K. Kossi, Johan Ivar Sæbo, Ola H. Titlestad, Romain R. Tohouri, Jørn Braa: “Comparing strategies to integrate Health Information System following a data warehouse approach in four countries”; IFIP 2009, Dubai, United Arab Emirates - 2009;
• Romain-Rolland Tohouri: ”Building e-Health Information Infrastructure in Mali”; IST-Africa 2009 Conference Proceedings, Paul Cunningham and Miriam Cunningham (Eds), IIMC International Information Management Corporation, 2008, ISBN: 978-1-905824-11-3
• Romain-Rolland Tohouri, Ime Asangansi, Ola Hodne Titlestad, Jørn Braa: “The Change Strategy towards an Integrated Health Information Infrastructure: Lessons from Sierra Leone”; HICSS-43 2009;
• Romain-Rolland Tohouri, Ime Asangansi: “The Sierra Leone HIS Case: Towards an Integrated Health Information Infrastructure”; IST-Africa 2009 Conference Proceedings, Paul Cunningham and Miriam Cunningham (Eds), IIMC International Information Management Corporation, 2008, ISBN: 978-1-905824-11-3;