As the humanitarian health response industry grows, there is a need for technical health expertise that can build an evidence base around outcome measures and raise the quality and accountability of the health relief response.We propose the formation of technical support units (TSUs), entities of health expertise institutionalized within humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which will bridge the gap between the demand for evidencebased, humanitarian programming and the field capacity to accomplish it. With the input of major humanitarian NGOs and donors, this paper discusses the attributes and capacities of TSUs; and the mechanisms for creating and enhancing TSUs within the NGO management structure.
