To achieve the goal of an efficient, equitable and safe delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine, Microsoft has launched a vaccine management platform for both government authorities and healthcare clients. The IT major in close collaboration with its partners, including Accenture, Avanade, EY and Mazik Global, are working on vaccine-management solutions that use Microsoft cloud services. The platform will enable registration capabilities for patients and providers, phased scheduling for vaccinations, streamlined reporting, and management dashboarding with analytics and forecasting.
“These offerings are helping public health agencies and healthcare providers to deliver the COVID-19 vaccine to individuals in an efficient, equitable and safe manner,” Microsoft said on Friday.
The company said the underlying technologies and approach have been tested and deployed with prior COVID-19 use cases, including contact tracing, COVID-19 testing, and return to work and return to school programs.
Microsoft Consulting Services (MCS) has deployed over 230 emergency COVID-19 response missions globally since the pandemic began in March, including recent engagements to ensure the equitable, secure and efficient distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine, said David Shaw, Chief Medical Officer and VP Healthcare, Worldwide Commercial Business, Microsoft.
Shaw said that MCS has developed an offering, the Vaccination Registration and Administration Solution (VRAS), which advances the capabilities of their COVID-19 solution portfolio and enables compliant administration of resident assessment, registration and phased scheduling for vaccine distribution. It enables the tracking and reporting of immunisation progress through secure data exchange that utilises industry standards, such as Health Level Seven (HL7), Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) and open APIs.
“Health providers and pharmacies can monitor and report on the effectiveness of specific vaccine batches, and health administrators can easily summarize the achievement of vaccine deployment goals in large population groups,” it said
Besides, several of its partners have leveraged the Microsoft cloud to provide customers with additional offerings to support vaccine management, he added.
The company said that there are currently two COVID-19 vaccines under accelerated review by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and European regulatory authorities that have reported safety and efficacy data in phase three clinical trials. Unlike the common flu vaccine, each of these COVID-19 vaccines poses similar and unique challenges in terms of procurement, distribution, administration and management, it said.
