What do Back to School Immunizations and Blockchain Have in Common?
A lot of us just finished witnessing a ritual that American families with children undergo at the start of every new school year. Parents and children prepare to return to school — buying backpacks and new school supplies, planning after school and extracurricular activities, scheduling last minute doctor visits and updating immunizations.
As it stands, all 50 states require specific vaccines for school-aged children. According to a recent poll, more than a third of parents of teens didn’t know when their child’s next vaccine is due and half of parents incorrectly assume that their doctor would initiate an appointment when the time came. The findings are based on responses from a national sample of 614 parents with at least one teen age 13 to 17. Yet another USA TODAY analysis of school vaccination records found that at more than 2,200 public and private schools in 12 states, at least a tenth of kindergarten students had either incomplete vaccination records or had fallen behind schedule in receiving their shots.
Student immunization records can be difficult to remember, obtain, organize and manage. Not surprisingly, many of us may still be taking care of back to school obligations, including looking for our children’s immunization records.
Currently, student immunization records come to school nurses in a variety of ways:
· Families share the paper records they have at home;
· Primary healthcare providers share student immunization records after receiving parent permission; and
· School nurses access state immunization information systems (where they are available).
With the Health Wizz mobile platform, parents will be able to download immunization records from patient portals found on their Pediatricians’ Electronic Medical Records Systems (EMR). When we add the ability to make the immunization records accessible on Ethereum blockchain, parents will be able to share their children’s health information with school nurses with the swipe of a finger. In turn, school nurses will review student immunization records online, and avoid the drudgery associated with paper work along with incomplete records and non-compliance. Parents will comfortably avoid the last-minute havoc of filling out consent forms, filling out tedious applications to retrieve their children’s immunization records, and trudging to their school nurse’s office armed with wads of paper records and proof of immunization.
With blockchain, parents, family physicians and other health care providers, as well as school nurses, can better track immunizations and manage their children’s care. Reminders of upcoming immunizations with due dates can also be sent from immunization registries to parents’ phones. And, as more and more parents build their children’s personalized immunization registries on their smart phones, blockchain accessible records can facilitate easy reviews of student immunization records.
Blockchain can also help school nurses verify the status of their student immunizations. Collaboration among school nurses, state immunization information systems (IIS) staff, students, families, state and local immunization programs becomes possible using blockchain:
Benefits of making immunization records accessible on a blockchain in a secure and private manner cannot be ignored:
· Easy retrieval of accurate student immunization records to meet school entry immunization requirements
· Interoperability between school records, public health records, and the IIS is enhanced
· Positive outcomes for both school and public health administration:
o Cost savings in terms of staff time
o Better management of vaccine supply
o Reduced number of unnecessary immunizations
o Enhanced funding due to improved daily attendance
