FAQs About Vaccine Distribution Management

Editor’s Note: This article references Work.com for Vaccines, which has been expanded upon with the launch of Vaccine Cloud. For the latest on Salesforce’s vaccine management solutions, check out this press release and FAQ.

Since the start of the pandemic, we’ve worked closely with government public health and healthcare organizations to support their response. Earlier this year, we launched Work.com, a suite of solutions and resources to help businesses and leaders reopen safely and support the health and wellbeing of their employees, customers and communities.

Now, the world is preparing to deliver one of the largest mass vaccination campaigns in human history, but managing the process of safely distributing effective COVID-19 vaccines to potentially billions of people will be extremely challenging.

It is clear that a vaccine management solution is needed. Work.com for Vaccines is the latest technology from Salesforce to help organizations, workplaces and schools around the world reopen safely.

Q. What is Work.com for Vaccines?

Work.com for Vaccines helps governments and healthcare organizations safely and efficiently manage vaccine programs at scale. They can design, build, integrate and manage their vaccine programs end-to-end, with a platform that is trusted, flexible and can be deployed quickly. Work.com for Vaccines helps our customers manage vaccine operations, from vaccination appointment registration and scheduling to inventory management and public health outreach.

They can schedule vaccine administration appointments, assure the availability and maintenance of adequate vaccine doses, and coordinate with healthcare professionals to administer the vaccine to their local constituents and patients. After vaccination, they can monitor, identify and quickly respond to help patients and constituents with any needs following vaccination, such as notifying them when to receive their second dose of the vaccine.

Q. What are some of the ways in which customers are using Salesforce to address Vaccine Management?

More than 15 international, federal, state and local agencies are using the Salesforce platform and Work.com for Vaccines to help manage their COVID-19 vaccine programs. Work.com for Vaccines provides a rapid and flexible approach for managing, delivering, and administering vaccine programs with the following solutions:

• Public Health Command Center: Public health and healthcare organizations can access a complete 360-degree view of vaccine management in order to make data-driven decisions and take action when needed. Insight into the health status of communities and current inventory levels can help inform vaccine service needs and accelerate response time.
• Vaccine Inventory Management: In order to meet public health needs, Vaccine Inventory Management helps organizations confirm availability and maintain adequate vaccine doses, syringes, and PPE stock levels. It can also aid in accurately forecasting demand, help reduce waste, and avoid surplus supplies that could be needed elsewhere.
• Vaccine Appointment Scheduling: With the large number of people that will need to be vaccinated in a short amount of time, Vaccination Appointment Scheduling helps organizations make sure the vaccine type and protocol history are available as needed. Easily schedule and prioritize vaccination appointments by helping clinicians perform health assessments, capture electronic consent, and determine eligibility.
• Clinical Vaccine Administration: Clinical Vaccine Administration can be used to help ensure medical professionals are trained on vaccine administration before delivery, and can help avoid onsite bottlenecks by using pre-arrival screenings. AI and data analysis tools also allow agencies to assess readiness, manage community health, log and track administration of the vaccine, and analyze community-wide vaccine results monitoring.

Q. What is Work.com customer adoption like?

Since its launch in May, many organizations have selected Work.com to reopen safely, including University of Kentucky, Siemens, Ohio State University, and Advanced Technology Group (ATG), a Cognizant company. Additionally, Salesforce is helping 43 states with their response to the COVID-19 pandemic with solutions including vaccine management, manual contact tracing and emergency response management.

Currently, 30 international federal, state and local agencies are using Salesforce technology for vaccine administration including Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, state of New Hampshire, city of Chicago, and more. That translates to up to 50 million people who will be covered by Work.com for Vaccines. Organizations (e.g. cities, states, counties) can be up and running on Work.com for Vaccines in a matter of weeks.

Q. How is Salesforce approaching data and transparency when it comes to vaccine management?

Trust is our number one value at Salesforce, and we’ve developed specific COVID-19 technology principles to guide our work in this area. It is especially important in highly regulated industries like healthcare, life sciences, public health and public sector. The Salesforce platform helps customers and organizations meet government compliance and security standards such as HIPAA, HITRUST, 21 CFR Part 11, FedRAMP and more. We share the responsibility in protecting user data by securing customer data on our platform, and by enabling developers and admins to configure the platform to meet their company’s or organization’s needs.

Interoperability was a key consideration in developing Work.com for Vaccines. Using the power of the Salesforce Customer 360 platform and MuleSoft, the #1 API-led integration platform, customers and organizations can seamlessly share data between public health information systems and registries and Salesforce.

Q: How is Salesforce working with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to manage vaccine distribution?

Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, an international public-private partnership providing life-saving vaccines to children in the world’s poorest countries, is working with Salesforce to manage critical information to equitably distribute approximately two billion COVID-19 vaccines to more than 189 countries by the end of 2021. You can read more about how Gavi is working with Salesforce here.

Q. How is Salesforce working with the City of Chicago and MTX to manage vaccine distribution?

MTX, a Platinum Salesforce consulting partner, launched a comprehensive end-to-end Vaccine Administration, Management, and Distribution Solution for state and local public health agencies built on the Salesforce platform. MTX recently collaborated with the City of Chicago to launch the first of its kind cloud-based vaccination management solution in the U.S. The program, called GETVAXCHI, was deployed to prepare for the upcoming flu season and the COVID-19 vaccination. You can read more about how MTX is working with Salesforce here.

Q. How is Salesforce working with IBM to manage vaccine distribution?

IBM and Salesforce are partnering to help organizations as they strive to safely reopen public places and provide individuals with a verifiable and privacy-preserving way to manage and share their vaccination and health status in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of this offering, IBM Digital Health Pass will integrate with the Salesforce Work.com platform. You can read more about how IBM is working with Salesforce here.

Q. Does Work.com support multiple electronic certification platforms?

Work.com for Vaccines is built on the Salesforce platform and allows for the integration of any Digital Health Credential. We’re working with IBM as a partner for implementing a digital health credential solution into the Salesforce platform. We’re excited about how Work.com can support our ecosystem of partners and customers–such as healthcare providers, employers, and public health agencies—moving forward.

You can read more about how IBM is working with Salesforce here.

Q. What is Salesforce’s involvement in the Vaccine Credential Initiative?

The Vaccination Credential Initiative (VCI) is working to enable individuals vaccinated for COVID-19 to access their vaccination records in a secure, verifiable and privacy-preserving way. The goal of the Vaccination Credential Initiative is to empower individuals with digital access to their vaccination records so they can use tools like CommonPass to safely return to travel, work, school, and life, while protecting their data privacy.

Coalition partners include CARIN Alliance, Cerner, Change Healthcare, The Commons Project Foundation, Epic, Evernorth, Mayo Clinic, Microsoft, MITRE, Oracle, Safe Health, and Salesforce.