Here are frequently asked questions for pediatricians to consider as they help parents and guardians feel confident in choosing to have their children vaccinated against COVID-19.

1. Is the COVID-19 vaccine safe for children?

Before a vaccine is released for administration, it undergoes FDA’s extensive lab testing and numerous clinical trials. Following the trials, the FDA, CDC, National Institutes of Health (NIH), and other federal agencies routinely monitor its use and investigate any potential safety concerns.

Now that federal health officials have approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for children 12 years and older, The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has also urged children to get the COVID-19 vaccine as soon as it is available to them.

2. What are the benefits of getting a COVID-19 vaccine?

• COVID-19 vaccines are effective; they can keep your child from getting and spreading the COVID-19 virus.

• Once your child is fully vaccinated, you and your child can start resuming normal activities.

• Vaccination provides a strong boost in protection to children who have already recovered from COVID-19.

• None of the COVID-19 vaccines contain the live virus that causes COVID-19, so a vaccine cannot infect your child with COVID-19.

3. What are the possible side effects of the COVID-19 vaccine in children?

Vaccination may have some side effects. These are normal indications that your child’s body is building immunity. Side effects may include redness, pain, and swelling on the arm where your child received the shot, fatigue, headache, muscle pain, chills, fever, and nausea.

4. Where can I receive a COVID-19 vaccine for my child?

Check your local pharmacy’s website to see if vaccination walk-ins or appointments are available. Contact your state or local health department for more information.

Find a COVID-19 Vaccine: Search vaccines.gov, text your ZIP code to 438829, or call 1-800-232-0233 to find locations near you in the U.S.

You may contact your child’s pediatrician for more information on how to access the COVID-19 vaccine.

5. How do I prepare a child for COVID-19 vaccination?

Before the visit:

• Read the vaccine materials that you received from CDC, FDA, or AAP. Note any questions you have for the pediatrician.
• Researchthe benefits and risks of the vaccines that your child will receive.
• Take alongyour child’s immunization record.

Support your child during the vaccine visit, possibly bringing  his or her favorite toy to comfort them during the vaccination. If your child is older, you can have an honest conversation, explaining that shots can pinch or sting, but that it won’t hurt for long.

During the visit:

• Read the vaccine information that your child will be receiving that day.
• Be calm and supportive during the vaccine shot.
• Once the shot is given, ask your pediatrician if NSAID pain relievers or other comfort measures may reduce the side effects of the vaccine.

After the visit:

Your child might experience mild reactions from the vaccine shot, such as pain at the injection spot, a rash, or a mild fever. These reactions are normal and will soon go away. Learn more.

6. Will the COVID-19 vaccine enable my child go back to school, sports, and other activities?

It is expected that when enough people are protected from the coronavirus, the risk of infection will begin to decline. Vaccines, along with mask-wearing, physical distancing, and other precautions will help ensure your child’s gradual return to school, sports, and other group activities in the future.

7. What is v-safe

V-safe is a free, smartphone-based tool that uses text messaging and web surveys to provide personalized health check-ins after your child receives a COVID-19 vaccination. Through v-safe, you can report side effects your child may experience and v-safe reminds you to get your child’s second dose.

How iPatientCare can help pediatricians?

iPatientCare offers a full suite of innovative healthcare technology products and value-added services that help pediatricians improve the health of their young patients by enhancing the care through care management, coordination, and analytics. iPatientCare’s solutions include remote patient monitoring, patent engagement, and a customizable Pediatric EHR.

Interested in learning more about how iPatientCare’s digital solutions are supporting providers during the pandemic? Contact us today.

“I do think the fall and winter of 2020 and 2021 are going to be probably one of the most difficult times we’ve experienced in American public health,” CDC Director Robert Redfield has said, citing this probability.

Why a Twindemic is Raises Concerns?

In 2020-21, it is likely we will face our first peak flu season alongside a second COVID-19 spike. With more than 240,000 Americans deceased, COVID-19 hospitalization rates are continuing to rise in many areas of the country. In addition to this, 40 to 50 million Americans are at high risk of contracting the influenza virus. CDC data (2010 – 2019) shows 12,000 – 61,000 deaths and 140,000 – 810,000 hospitalizations every year due to seasonal flu. The deadly overlapping of two contagious viruses could pose a serious problem for healthcare providers and systems around the nation.

What about this Year’s Flu Shot?

Healthcare officials are advising people to get their flu shot to lower the effects of seasonal flu on public healthcare system. A higher number of vaccinations would make a big difference in lowering the impact of a possible twindemic. According to the CDC, the vaccine’s effectiveness may vary from person to person, depending on their demography. Even if the vaccine doesn’t prevent someone from getting the flu, it may help to lessen serious symptoms.

How a Virtual Care Platform – TELEMEDICINE can Help?

Amidst the anxiety surrounding a twindemic, one thing is evident: patients will seek virtual care platforms to communicate their seasonal flu and/or COVID-19 symptoms with their healthcare providers. The recent pandemic has forced healthcare providers and organizations to adopt telemedicine solutions at a rapid rate.

Telehealth is bridging the gap between patients and healthcare providers. It enables symptomatic patients to stay at home and communicate with clinicians through virtual tools. Thus, helping to reduce the spread of the virus to mass populations and the frontline medical staff. Telehealth solutions can also be used for non-urgent communication to reduce pressure on emergency rooms and clinics.

The possible twindemic demands healthcare providers & organizations across the nation to prepare with a strong virtual care platform. They should expand access to care and reduce the need for in-person clinic visits. These measures will automatically lower the risk of community infection by keeping more sick people at home.

If you are planning to deploy or switch to a robust Virtual Care Platform, receive a live demonstration of digital healthcare solutions provided by iPatientCare and ready your practice with the best.

Along with technology and strategy, effective collaboration of public health authorities with private health care providers, laboratories, and community-based organizations, plays a successful role in delivering care. Synchronizing all three to conduct medical testing, effective contact tracing, and quickly distinguishing new patterns of COVID-19 expansion will help in identifying new ways to improve all of these activities. Improving these factors is crucial as the world begins to open shortly.

Here are some of the immediate possible ways to improve interoperability and exchange of key data, which will enable public health programs to work more effectively with private health care providers, clinical laboratories, and other critical partners in COVID-19 containment efforts.

•   Improvement in Commercial Lab Reporting

Lab reporting of positive COVID-19 patients is a cornerstone of public health surveillance. However, many of these laboratory results are missing with essential data, including basic patient address or zip code, which is the least basic information used to identify the infection clusters, disease hotspots, and contact cases to complete the investigations, and match patient information, to build supportive care quality network.

Firstly, there is an opportunity to use existing systems to improve the flow of key data to public health. Just by adding ‘ask at order entry’ fields to capture key demographics will ensure the bridge between electronic health records, laboratory information management systems, and commercial laboratories. These will also support the public health response to prioritize solutions that has broad applicability to all data sources.

On the other hand, more scalable solution that allows labs to use application programming interface (API) to request providers for the patient’s commonly missing data elements such as, race/ethnicity, phone number, address, medical record number + DOB or payer + subscriber number — either directly to provider EMRs or through Health Information Exchanges (HIEs).

• Enhancement in Case Investigations with Clinical Data

Case investigations often starts with attempting to locate clinical data for the patient’s course of illness, additional conditions, and demographics. This is currently categorized as a burdensome and a difficult process concerning the COVID-19 epidemic, because most of the health departments have to rely on manual queries, and some have been requesting logins to individual hospital EHRs even when they are interoperable.

Over the past few years, national interoperability networks have well emerged to accelerate secure clinical data exchange between providers trusted electronic framework. Interoperable networks sharing required data, enables direct support to the treatment of patients.

iPatientCare’s trusted framework primarily provide standards and governance for data exchange.

•  Enhance Use of the National Syndromic Surveillance Program (NSSP)

Syndromic surveillance method supports the detection of individual and population health indicators that are available before confirmed diagnoses are made. It provides valuable insights into tracking the COVID-19 outbreak.

There are few challenges with data-sharing agreements, governing the flow of syndromic surveillance data between state and federal health officials. Therefore, there have been parallel federal efforts – “national coronavirus surveillance systems” which tracks the flow of patients in emergency departments from private-sector databases, resulting in duplication of efforts and data inconsistencies within state and local health officials.

There are also several technical changes to the Syndromic Surveillance that will improve the accuracy and consistency of reported data. Good implementation of technical changes will enable fresh start for Syndromic Surveillance messaging standard. Afterward, it could be rolled out to all vendors as part of the Promoting Interoperability program.

However, enhancements to NSSP will allow a single system to be used to track multiple types of healthcare events now and in the future. Using a single, consistent system will effectively improve the epidemiological capacity.

Bringing federal, state, and local lawmakers on the same page to improve data exchange and interoperability, will help us get through the current crisis of coronavirus and prepare us better for the next one.

If you are also struggling to enable your technology framework with interoperability standards to communicate, exchange data, and use the information, then you must have a look at iPatientCare’s easy and secure Interoperability software.

Under Care coordination, healthcare providers have to understand patient’s needs and preferences ahead of time, it should be communicated to the right people at the right time, and the information collected is used to provide safe, suitable, and effective care to the patient. Using an efficient Care Coordination Software, healthcare organizations or providers can reduce care fragmentation with effective referrals and transitions taking place. Providers can leverage care collaboration, and identify potential COVID-19 patients in real-time.

• Real-time Care Coordination

Deploying care coordination solution with evidence-based clinical assessments and care plan tools in healthcare organization, coordinates care across the continuum. It helps to manage high-risk, post-acute, and complex chronic disease patients. With these real-time insights and notifications, providers can better collaborate with each other on how to best prepare for, treatment, allocation of resources, and deliver care to those high-risk patients.

• Holistic view of your patient’s medical history

During the time of crisis, the Care Coordination platform can maintain the Master Patient Index (MPI) and Longitudinal Health Record for each patient. It helps providers with specific sets of patient information (query-based exchange) that determine the treatment plan and intervene proactively towards patient care at both the patient and population level. Care Coordination Software also supports the exchange of information using C-CDA and CCR standards.

• Referral network of trusted healthcare provider

The Care Coordination platform provides a network of trusted healthcare providers to enable easy and efficient transition of care during the time of health care provider’s shortage. The providers can search and connect to other healthcare providers using the directory services of in-network and out-of-network providers. The software can share referrals and consultations instantaneously, securely, and deliver it right into the recipients’ EHR.

Related Article: 7 Features You Shouldn’t Ignore When Selecting Care Coordination Software

• Care planning and monitoring

While managing the situation during the pandemic, it becomes very important for providers to keep patients on track and allow them to meet their healthcare goals as soon as possible. The Care Coordination Software platform provides risk assessment and decision support tools – to prevent and monitor patients with chronic conditions, to provide advanced care planning and management for patients with acute problems. The integrated system supports healthcare providers with timely and efficient healthcare via data integration and statistical learning to reduce unplanned hospitalization and readmission.

• Patient Engagement 

During the pandemic of infectious disease, it’s obviously not important to have one to one engagement, therefor an intuitive and interactive tool such as smartphones, tablets, or a web-browser plays a very important role. Providers can ask patients, to access their health records and receive automated reminders for medications, home monitoring tests, and care management protocols. Patients can also submit home-monitoring data and provide feedback on the care management protocols driven questionnaire using an easy and intuitive interface of Care Coordination Software.

Care coordination is known as a key strategy that has the potential to improve the effectiveness, safety, and efficiency of the health care system. In the time of the global health care crisis, health care organizations and providers have to put their efforts towards delivering well-designed, and targeted care coordination to the right people, which can improve outcomes for both – patients and providers.

If you are also looking to redesign your health care system to provide better coordinate patients’ care then you must have a look at iPatientCare’s Care Coordination Software to enhance existing or emerging care management programs.

Telemedicine before pandemic

Telehealth’s potential has always revolved around bringing the doctor to the patient, irrespective of their location, but the only healthcare beneficiaries that qualified for telemedicine services before COVID-19, had to be seen in these circumstances:

• Healthcare region outside the metropolitan area 
• Heath provider shortage in a rural tract 
• Connect to healthcare specialists at different location. 

The market place wasn’t quite productive because there wasn’t any sincere demand for infrastructure related to telemedicine but, the dynamic of the telemedicine is changing with the shift to consumer-based care. Now, specialists are developing their own infrastructure to launch their own telehealth platform to consumers, offering their services online much like a banker, real estate agent, or another business person.

Telemedicine during the pandemic 

COVID-19 has prompted a rapid adoption of telemedicine. The pandemic has changed the way patients and doctors interact with each other. Due to global lockdown like situation and risk of infection, people are not going to clinics and healthcare organizations to consult with doctors physically. This situation had put them both to adopt telemedicine as the platform to communicate. 

Providers who previously didn’t offer telehealth services, are now struggling hard to implement the technology at their place of work. Adoption of telemedicine prevents clinicians from being infected by COVID-positive patients and also protects patients from potentially contracting the coronavirus from the frontline healthcare providers – which is now a day a very real risk in a complex and chaotic healthcare environment. 

Telemedicine and virtual connectivity are creating a more efficient, organized healthcare continuum during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Telemedicine, post COVID-19

“This toothpaste is not going back into the tube. Telehealth will be the new normal after the coronavirus pandemic subsides.”

Telemedicine has been a boon to all healthcare providers during the coronavirus pandemic. It has proved that telemedicine is here to stay forever. 

Illness does not stop before nor it will stop after the pandemic. The COVID 19  has helped more and more people to come out of their pre-mindset of receiving face to face healthcare and access telemedicine as a mode of receiving healthcare. Due to the acceptance of new technology and belief on the same, there will be lots of new users coming on board in the near future.

The pandemic has already helped providers to develop infrastructure for telemedicine technology. Several states have also waived certain licensure and other restrictions to permit expanded telemedicine services during the pandemic. Many insurers are also expanding access and reducing costs for their members. Therefore, a good range of providers, such as doctors, nurse practitioners, clinical psychologists, and licensed clinical social workers, will now be able to offer telehealth to their patients.

Add on technology upgrades like Artificial Intelligence (AI), telemedicine can be used in broader terms. For example – Telemedicine digital solution with integrated Patient EMR/EHRand cloud-connected medical devices and sensors such as ECG, Spo2, BP, temperature, pulse oximeter, and blood sugar carries real-time information sharing between machine and remote doctor, which helps in expanding value-based healthcare to remote patients. 

Telemedicine is here to stay, and it holds the future of healthcare practice. The patients will ultimately benefit the providers who can figure out how to incorporate safe, effective, and efficient telehealth services into their practices.