Florida SHOTS™: Keeping SHOTS in Check

What will happen to all of the immunization records in your office should disaster strike?

If they are paper records, they are subject to water and fire loss. Electronic records are only better if your system has an offsite backup storage that remains secure during the disaster. Remote backups ensure that the records will be there for your office once it is back up and running, but they do not guarantee access for your patients who may be forced to evacuate to other parts of the state or even the US.

The only way to protect your immunization records and keep them available for all your patients regardless of where they go is to store those records in Florida SHOTS, a free, statewide, Web-based immunization registry. This was borne out in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when soon after the storm, Florida’s registry could access the Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama state registries.

With this access, the help desk offered assistance for looking up immunization records for evacuees. Florida SHOTS’ staff received and responded to hundreds of inquiries from health departments, private providers, and schools and found many immunization records for children displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

Millions Saved in Vaccine and Admin Fees
“The Success of an Immunization Information System in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina” by Julie A. Boom, MD, Anna C. Dragsbaek, JD, and Cynthia S. Nelson, MPH, published in Pediatrics, Volume 119, Number 6, June 2007, looked at the benefits of immunization information systems (IIS) in the Houston area following Hurricane Katrina.

According to the article’s abstract, “within days after Hurricane Katrina in September 2005, the Houston-Harris County Immunization Registry was connected to the Louisiana Immunization Network for Kids Statewide. This linkage provided immediate access to the immunization records of children who were forced to evacuate the New Orleans, Louisiana area. One year later, 18,900 immunization records have been found, representing an estimated cost savings of more than $1.6 million for vaccine alone and $3.04 million for vaccine plus administration fees. This experience demonstrated the vital and previously unrecognized functionality of immunization information systems in a public health emergency.”

“In the immediate days after this devastating event, 200,000 evacuees from the greater New Orleans area headed for Houston, Texas. Most evacuees arrived with few personal belongings. Needless to say, most children’s immunizations records were left at home.”

“To assist public health officials in searching for children’s immunization records, the Web-based immunization registry was made available to providers in the makeshift medical clinics in the Astrodome and George R. Brown Convention Center. Health care workers at these shelters were able to readily access records for children by using the HHCIR-LINKS connection.”

Be Prepared
Hurricanes are a fact of life in Florida. Please join us in being prepared should disaster—natural or manmade—strike our state. If you’re not already enrolled in Florida SHOTS, enrollment is free. If you are enrolled, please ensure that you input shots in the registry either manually or through automated data upload so that those records are protected.

For more information about the registry, enrollment, usage, or data upload, please call 877-888-SHOT (7468) or visit www.flshots.com. Together, we can work to protect our children from vaccine-preventable diseases and safeguard their shot records from unforeseen disaster.

Pharmacies wishing to provide adult influenza vaccinations to their customers are required by Section 465.189, Florida Statutes to enter those shot records into Florida SHOTS™, the statewide online immunization registry. Florida SHOTS data upload significantly reduces record-keeping time for pharmacists and is the easiest way for them to comply with the statutory reporting requirements.

• Florida SHOTS data upload technology offers a simple batching linkage from your existing billing, practice management, or EMR software to the statewide immunization registry.
• It allows pharmacists to automatically upload shot records, avoiding manual data entry and saving hours of time.
• Florida SHOTS has successfully implemented data upload linkages with multiple medical software companies, managed care organizations, health systems, and private physicians practices for the past two years.
• We have the expertise to create a data upload linkage with your corporation’s software so that you can easily comply with the reporting requirements of your adult influenza vaccination program.

Children need vaccinations to stay healthy. Vaccinations protect a child now and in the future by preventing diseases that can sometimes kill or permanently injure.

Infants are more likely to suffer complications, or even death, if they contract a vaccine-preventable disease. For example, measles is the number one vaccine-preventable disease that kills infants worldwide.

Florida SHOTS is a tool that can be used to increase immunization levels thereby helping the entire community because increased immunization levels offer better protection for all children. The registry does this by identifying under-immunized children.

Florida SHOTS helps parents by:

• Consolidating all immunization records for any vaccinations that a child has received from multiple health-care providers
• Providing an accurate, official copy of a child’s immunization history for personal, day care, school, or camp entry requirements
• Maintaining a system-certified electronic 680 (once created by a participating health-care provider) which is accessible directly to schools, licensed child-care centers and other medical providers that are Florida SHOTS users
• Helping ensure that a child’s immunizations are up to date
• Providing reminders or recalls when an immunization is due or has been missed
• Helping ensure timely immunization for children whose families move or switch health-care providers
• Preventing unnecessary duplicative immunization
• Allowing emergency room access to a patient’s immunization status

The growing complexity of the immunization schedule makes it difficult for health-care providers and parents to keep track of which vaccines are due and when.

Busy practices have found that Florida SHOTS can assist them in the challenges of assessing ever-changing and complex immunization requirements and schedules involving different vaccine manufacturers and combination vaccines.

Florida SHOTS was designed with functionality that provides the following benefits to providers.

• Immunization records from all providers are consolidated into one record per patient.
• Immunization information is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
• The registry provides a reliable immunization history for any child, whether a new or continuing patient.
• It identifies patients’ previously reported contraindications.
• The registry provides definitive information, reminders and recalls on immunizations that are due or overdue.
• The registry produces the legal immunization record (DH Form 680) required for school, camp, and day care center attendance.
• It allows providers to create a system-certified electronic 680, which is kept in Florida SHOTS where it is accessible directly to schools, licensed child-care centers and other medical providers that are Florida SHOTS users.
• It generates immunization reports for managed-care organizations.
• The registry reduces paperwork by automating inventory, reporting, recall and reminder functions.
• It provides current recommendations and information on new vaccines.
• The registry facilitates introduction of new vaccines or changes in the vaccine schedule.