The National Digital Strategy (NDS) is the plan developed by the Federal Government of to promote the adoption and development of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in five areas: governmental transformation, economy, education, health and safety.
In regard to the health sector, NDS aims to achieve universal and effective health, increase coverage, enabling effective access to quality health services and ensure the efficient use of resources.
In response, the National Center for Youth and Children’s Health (CENSIA) and the Carlos Slim Foundation developed Electronic Immunization Records (EIR).
EIR is a hybrid electronic system that monitors health system users’ vaccination scheme along their lifeline, generating nominal census for vaccination. This system also provides national information on productivity per facility, administrative jurisdiction and federal state; with appropriate data that is captured just once. EIR is also interoperable, i.e., it allows information exchange and validation between public health sector systems.
The main objectives of the EIR are:
- Provide an electronic tool for identification and immunization.
- Increase the records on immunization coverage.
- Easily identify patients using an NFC chip and the nominal database.
- Access to the national database.
- Improve information quality.
- Enabling information exchange between different health information systems.
- Being the tool for each patient’s immunization data portability.
The implementation of the EIR will be in two stages. But before that, a pilot program is being developed that will run from 20 October 2014 to April 2015. This pilot will be performed in three phases of two months each in a health center in Colima and another in the State of Mexico. It will include training and participation of all staff involved with vaccination in both hospitals.
In the EIR’s first implementation phase, only the electronic tablet application will be tested. In a second phase that application will be synchronized through the web to build a cloud database; which will be available to health personnel throughout the country.
Each patient’s information will be updated and available not only on the tablet and the cloud, but also on the EIR itself. This will help improving both vaccination coverage and quality of information. Also will help to have a better control on health centers’ vaccines inventories and will facilitate vaccinator’s work.
In CENSIA’s facilities, was conducted the EIR’s presentation and the training of the pilot program vaccinators and supervisors, who were given 28 tablets and a thousand chips.
The challenges ahead are to ensure the EIR’s agile and simple use for a wide range of users, ability of storing the complete record of each patient through innovative technologies like NFC chips, and developing a system that can be used with or without an Internet connection.
When all the country’s vaccinators identify EIR as an approachable tool that provides them support, guidance and recommendations on the application of vaccines, giving information on the biological inventory, supply analysis, and vaccination coverage, the Electronic Immunization Records’ objectives will be met.
If you want to know more about EIR follow the links below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86SMCqiTAzI&feature=youtu.be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPpdz3KwD-c&feature=youtu.be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmVRUnldjEY&feature=youtu.be
