This community innovation has been accepted at the 2025 DHIS2 Annual Conference
VPD-SMART in the Americas : A wide deployment plan
The epidemiological surveillance of vaccine preventable diseases (VPD’s), such as Measles, Rubella, and Acute Flaccid Paralysis, is undergoing a technological transformation through a continent wide update to its registration system. Currently, most Latin American and Caribbean countries use the Integrated Surveillance Information System (ISIS) for monitoring and recording these diseases. However, PAHO’s modernization effort has driven the need to migrate to a new digital platform: VPD-SMART (Vaccine Preventable Diseases Surveillance, Monitoring, Analysis, Reporting and Tracking), developed on the DHIS2 platform. This technological transformation requires an approach adaptable to the diverse realities of each country. To address this, four distinct implementation mechanisms have been identified, allowing each country to choose the option that best suits its capabilities and resources: 1. Direct use of VPD-SMART hosted on a regional server, managed by PAHO. 2. Use of VPD-SMART hosted on a local server, managed by the country. 3. Hybrid use of VPD-SMART via interoperability with local information systems. 4. Integration with the PAHO data warehouse. Each mechanism has a series of requirements linked to concepts such as technological infrastructure, legacy data migration, technical support, staff training, and information security. Given the large number of countries adopting VPD-SMART, the implementation process has been standardized into a deployment plan with five phases to ensure a rigorous and efficient transition: I. Initiation: Phase of negotiations and system demonstration. II. Formalization of the request for implementation. III. Diagnosis and analysis of data flows and definition of the implementation mechanism. IV. Implementation, training and testing. V. Officialization. VPD-SMART promises to improve the quality of data, contributing to decision making in public health and the control of VPD’s.
Primary Author: MARTHA VELANDIA-GONZALEZ
Keywords:
Vaccine-preventable disease surveillance, VPD-SMART, DHIS2, The Americas, Acute Flaccid Paralysis, Measles/Rubella, deployment plan, implementation mechanisms, regional and local server, interoperability, public health.