SOML Health Facility Score

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Assess Health Facility Performance with the SOML Framework

The Saving One Million Lives (SOML) initiative, launched by the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Health, set an ambitious target to save one million lives by improving the quality of healthcare delivery at the primary and secondary levels. A key component of the programme is the performance-based financing model that scores health facilities across a range of indicators. The SOML Health Facility Score tool on ToolWard lets facility managers, state health officers, and programme evaluators calculate their facility's performance score using the SOML framework, right in the browser with no software installation required.

What the SOML Score Covers

The SOML performance assessment evaluates health facilities across multiple domains that reflect the breadth of primary healthcare delivery. These include maternal and child health indicators such as antenatal care attendance, skilled birth attendance, and immunisation coverage. They also include disease management metrics like malaria case management, tuberculosis detection, and HIV testing uptake. Structural indicators covering staffing levels, drug availability, equipment functionality, and record-keeping completeness round out the assessment.

For each indicator, you input your facility's data, and the SOML Health Facility Score tool calculates the points earned. The indicators are weighted according to the SOML methodology, producing a composite score that reflects overall facility performance.

Why This Score Matters in Nigeria's Health System

Under the SOML programme, performance scores directly influence funding allocation. Higher-performing facilities receive additional resources, creating an incentive for continuous improvement. Lower-performing facilities receive targeted support and capacity building. The score is not punitive; it's designed to identify where investment and training are needed most.

For state-level health administrators, aggregated facility scores reveal geographic and systemic patterns. If most facilities in a particular local government area score poorly on immunisation coverage, the intervention needs to happen at the supply chain or community mobilisation level, not at the individual facility level. The SOML Health Facility Score tool helps identify these patterns by making facility-level scoring quick and standardised.

Who Should Use This Tool?

Health facility managers and officers in charge at primary health centres and general hospitals across Nigeria can use the tool to self-assess before the official SOML evaluation. Knowing your score in advance lets you focus improvement efforts on the indicators where you're losing the most points.

State and LGA health teams responsible for supporting facilities can use the tool to pre-screen facility performance and prioritise supportive supervision visits.

SOML programme officers and evaluators can use the tool as a quick cross-check during field assessments, verifying calculations on the spot rather than waiting for back-office data processing.

NGOs and development partners supporting health system strengthening in Nigeria can use facility scores to measure the impact of their interventions and report to donors with clear, quantifiable outcomes.

Practical Application

A primary health centre in Nasarawa State is preparing for its quarterly SOML assessment. The officer in charge enters the facility's data into the SOML Health Facility Score tool: 78% antenatal care coverage, 52% skilled birth attendance, 85% childhood immunisation coverage, 90% malaria case management compliance, and adequate staffing levels. The composite score comes back at 68 out of 100. The weakest area is skilled birth attendance, which the officer knows is due to a shortage of midwives and community preference for traditional birth attendants.

She uses the score breakdown to write a targeted improvement plan: request midwife deployment from the state health office, engage community leaders and traditional birth attendants in a referral partnership, and improve the birthing room to make it more welcoming. At the next assessment, skilled birth attendance has risen to 64%, and the overall score improves to 74.

Tips for Maximising Your SOML Score

Focus on high-weight indicators first. Not all indicators carry equal weight in the SOML framework. Improving a heavily weighted indicator by a few percentage points may have more impact on your score than perfecting a lightly weighted one.

Improve data quality. Many facilities lose points not because they aren't delivering services, but because those services aren't properly recorded. Ensure registers, tally sheets, and monthly reports are complete and accurate before the assessment.

Use the tool for monthly self-assessment. Don't wait for the formal evaluation. Run the SOML Health Facility Score calculator monthly to track your trajectory and catch deterioration early.

Engage the whole team. Share the score with all facility staff. When everyone understands which indicators drive the score and how their daily work contributes, performance improvement becomes a collective effort rather than a management exercise.