Supporting WA hospital COVID-19 vaccination clinics
COVID-19 vaccination clinics at WA public hospitals have been instrumental in protecting our frontline healthcare and high-risk workers since WA’s COVID-19 vaccination campaign commenced earlier this year.
Typically established within a few short hours, set up of these vaccination clinic’s is no easy feat. As the shared services centre for the WA health system, various teams across HSS have risen to the challenge of supporting our customers to set-up these clinics and often at short notice.
Teams from ICT, Procurement and Supply, Workforce and Organisational Development and the VaccinateWA Program all responded to the challenge and upheld the HSS value of making a difference together.
This included ensuring clinics have had access to
- staff who can administer vaccinations
- IT devices and systems to record vaccinations and make bookings for second doses
- training on the use of the VaccinateWA booking system.
One of the many COVID-19 vaccination clinics HSS helped establish was at Royal Perth Hospital (RPH) which opened in February 2021.
The clinic has provided over 25,000 vaccinations to various WA health system employees, including many from HSS. At its busiest, the clinic administered more than 1,600 COVID-19 vaccinations a week or about 350 vaccinations in one day!
RPH COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic Manager, Diana Teow said the success of the clinic would not have been possible without help from HSS.
“The support we received from various HSS Teams has been nothing short of extraordinary,” Diana said.
“They responded quickly to our requests and provided invaluable assistance in getting our clinic up and running.
“Having the ICT and VaccinateWA support team on hand to assist with any issues and ensure everything was running smoothly, was fantastic. It meant our front-line staff are not held-up and can focus on getting people checked-in and vaccinated.”
With more than 300 needles, syringes and injection trays used every day in the RPH COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic, HSS supply teams also continue to ensure adequate stock is always on hand by arranging priority delivery and follow up of inventory.
Maintaining adequate staffing has also proven to be a challenge for the RPH COVID-19 vaccination clinic, especially given the unpredictable nature of COVID-19.
RPH clinic staff can be diverted to assist with COVID-19 testing in the event of an outbreak, leaving the vaccine clinic operating with skeleton staff.
To help with workforce and fluctuating demand, HSS’ Employee Services team was able to quickly appoint 36 vaccination nurses to support the RPH clinic through an active nursing recruitment pool to assist with the COVID-19 response.
HSS Chief Executive Robert Toms praised the efforts of all HSS teams for acting quickly to assist with the set-up of hospital and community vaccination clinics.
“The responsiveness and adaptability by all HSS teams have made a positive impact on our state’s COVID-19 vaccination program,” he said.
“It’s a credit to everyone’s dedication and commitment to supporting our customers in this ever-changing and unpredictable COVID-19 environment.”
Getting vaccinated remains one of our main defences against COVID-19. If you haven’t received your vaccination, visit the Roll Up for WA website.