Tools to support physicians COVID-19 vaccine efforts

Tools to support physicians' COVID-19 vaccine efforts

As primary care clinics and community physicians in Alberta are becoming increasingly aware of their role in supporting the COVID-19 immunization efforts, two different toolkits have been developed to support physicians and their clinics:

Be a Vaccine Positive Clinic
The Be a Vaccine Positive Clinic toolkit is an easy to navigate web-based tool that includes practical content relevant to physicians and their teams. It is regularly updated and uses evidence-based information from multiple sources. The example tools can be easily revised and implemented to fit each the individual needs of each clinic.

The toolkit is divided into three sections:

Be Informed: Includes information on vaccine safety, vaccinating special populations, reporting adverse events and additional Canadian vaccine resources.
Be Visible: This section has answers to common patient questions, materials to support clinics to become leaders in vaccine promotion including customizable patient materials, example videos, posters, and more.
Accelerate Uptake: Scripts and EMR tools for primary care providers and their teams to address and document vaccine hesitancy and uptake.

The Be a Vaccine Positive Clinic toolkit was created by staff from the Accelerating Change Transformation Team (ACTT) at the Alberta Medical Association and includes Alberta specific information.

Primary Care COVID-19 Immunization Toolkit

The Primary Care COVID-19 Immunization Toolkit is a national web-based toolkit to help primary care clinics find information about COVID-19 vaccines and how to plan immunization clinics in their own clinic. It has materials to support patients making decisions about getting vaccinated or to give immunizations in your clinic.

The toolkit is divided into four sections:

Inform and Identify Patients: immunization status, engaging vaccine hesitant patients, resources to update patients, identifying eligible patients and key populations. This section is useful for all primary care offices, whether you are planning your own Immunization Clinic or not.
Plan Your Immunization Clinic: this section has tools to help determine your clinic’s capacity for immunization (e.g. number of patients to book), downloadable resources to prepare a clinic and support planning the details of your clinic, including example checklists.
Run Your Immunization Clinic: what is needed the day before immunization, how to manage the day of immunization, and how to wrap up an immunization clinic.
Follow Up with Your Patients: This section helps with how to follow up with missed patents, and monitor side effects and adverse events.

The toolkit was developed by the University of British Columbia’s Innovation Support Unit from the Department of Family Practice with the support of a pan-Canadian collaboration including localization of provincial information by ACTT. The toolkit aligns with advice from multiple sources.