The Digital Team’s Important Role in COVID-19 Vaccinations

// By Jared Johnson // 

Ask the Expert with Zain Ismail, Principal Transformation Consultant, Strategy and Digital Health, Henry Ford Health System

This chapter of the pandemic is the time for nonclinical teams to shine, according to Zain Ismail, principal transformation consultant for the Henry Ford Health System.

In particular, digital marketing and communications teams are stepping up and playing a key role in COVID-19 vaccine rollouts. Provider organizations are leaning on digital teams once again to make quick decisions and convey vital information as they stand up vaccination sites at a scale unprecedented in the industry.

We recently spoke with Ismail about how to create a desirable patient experience for vaccinations and the digital aspects of quick communications and decision-making.

eHST: Give us an overview of Henry Ford Health’s COVID-19 system incident command for COVID-19 vaccinations.

Zain Ismail, principal transformation consultant for the Henry Ford Health System

ZI: Our System Incident Command (SIC) is an emergency management structure used to command, control, and coordinate our emergency response. In this case, it’s the vaccination of hundreds of thousands of patients. It provides our teams, operations, logistics, patient engagement, safety, security, and IT with a common hierarchy to seek approvals for recommendations. Our SIC for vaccination deployment went live on January 12, 2021.

eHST: Among other responsibilities, you serve in the capacity of chief of planning to the incident commander. How do you help such a large team make quick decisions that can impact patient safety? 

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