Learning Objectives for this Presentation:
By the end of the presentation participants will be able to:
- Understand the functional requirements and benefits of a web-based clinical data repository supporting vaccine associated adverse events evaluation and case management.


Background:
The Vaccine Healthcare Centers (VHC) Network consists of four (4) regional sites within the Military Healthcare System (MHS) that support enhanced vaccine safety surveillance and expert clinical consultations for optimized case management of vaccine adverse events (VAEs) to include evaluation, treatment and follow-up. Sharing of information and continuous case reviews with multidisciplinary specialty input are core to the functional network and its mission of identifying new case definitions and evolving clinical guidelines that capture lessons learned.


Setting:
VHC Network clinical sites, with future capability to support worldwide accessibility by patients and healthcare workers to secure, web-based consultative services.


Population:
Service members and beneficiaries eligible for care in the Military Healthcare System as well as health care providers supporting this population.


Project Description:
To improve data collection, web conferencing case review processes as well as outcomes monitoring, the VHC created a secure, web-based, encrypted network-wide database (VAECS) linking pertinent data elements to include the adverse event(s) symptoms, vaccine(s), diagnoses, medications, progress notes, and quality of life outcomes. Over 1700 cases are in the system.


Results/Lessons Learned:
Implementation of the VAECS has improved the efficiency of VAEs case management, case review and outcomes tracking with overall quality improvements in documentation and data mining. Myopericarditis cases following smallpox vaccination are currently tracked within VAECS. As a result of iterative case reviews, case definitions and guidelines for rare adverse events have evolved for headaches and prolonged myalgia and/or arthralgia syndrome.