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Notices

Storage & Handling Checkup: Temperature Monitoring

Storage & Handling Checkup: Temperature Monitoring

Vaccines are temperature sensitive and must be stored in specific temperature ranges to preserve their viability. Vaccines that are exposed to out of range temperatures can lose potency, and people vaccinated with these vaccines will not get the protection they need.
To ensure that every dose of vaccine that is administered at your site is viable, it is critical to monitor unit temperatures in two ways:
  • Digital Data Logger (DDL) – records temperatures, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
    • Why? This provides documentation that every dose in your unit has been stored at the right temperature from the time you received it until it is administered to a patient.
  • Paper Temperature Logs – records twice daily temperature checks.
    • Why? This provides a chance to visually check the unit and ensure that the temperatures have not been out out range.
Check Up: Review, Evaluate, and Update!
Make sure that your clinic is recording, reporting and documenting your temperate data the right way.
1. Download and submit your DDL data and send it to our team every 28 days, when ordering vaccine or experiencing a temperature excursion.
2. Fill out the paper temperature log twice each clinic day. When filling out the paper log, always use the DDL as your reference.
Make sure you have the most up-to-date logs:Fridge Temperature Log (Fahrenheit)Freezer Temperature Log (Fahrenheit)Fridge Temperature Log (Celsius)Freezer Temperature Log (Celsius)3. Keep your paper and DDL (electronic) temperature logs on file for 3 years for VFC and VFAAR providers and for 7 years for COVID providers. Our team will review your paper temperature logs during the next site visit to your clinic.
Have questions? Reach out to our team at TempCheck@phila.gov for assistance.

Monkeypox Vaccine Deliveries Paused for Thanksgiving

Monkeypox Vaccine Deliveries Paused for Thanksgiving

Monkeypox vaccine deliveries will be paused during the week of Thanksgiving, November 21 – 25, 2022. The last delivery for monkeypox vaccine will be on Monday, November 21. 

Ordering will remain open this week until Thursday, by 5pm. Remember to submit your temperatures to tempcheck@phila.gov and complete a reconciliation of vaccine on hand for your order to be approved.

Click the button below to submit your order request for monkeypox vaccine.

Order Monkeypox Vaccine

Deliveries for monkeypox vaccine will resume on the week of November 28.

Thank you for keeping Philadelphia safe and healthy! If you have any questions, please contact Kenya Mack at Kenya.Mack@phila.gov. 

Limited Single Dose Vials of Pfizer Bivalent Becoming Available

Limited Single Dose Vials of Pfizer Bivalent Becoming Available

On Monday, November 14 through Tuesday, November 15, PDPH will open pre-ordering in Philavax for a limited amount of the updated (bivalent) Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people 12 years of age or older in single-dose vials. Deliveries will begin several days later. Single dose vials will not be available for ordering through Monday.com – partial ordering – or pickup.This limited rollout is intended to expand the number of locations that offer the updated vaccine. Only sites that would otherwise not be able to utilize the standard six-dose per vial bivalent Pfizer will be approved to order single dose vials. Large health systems and sites with regular patient volumes/throughput should continue to order the six-dose per vial bivalent Pfizer.Ancillary kits will not be distributed with orders of single-dose vials. Single-dose vials do not require the use of low-dead-volume (LDV) syringes.Quick Facts:Single-Dose Vial Pfizer Bivalent Booster (Ages 12+)• NDC: 59267-1404-02• Configuration: 10 single-dose vials/carton• Minimum quantity per order: 50 doses• Maximum quantity per order: 150 doses• Product dimensions: 1.457 in length × 1.535 in width × 3.504 in height• Storage and handling: Same as other Pfizer tris products (e.g., store at ultra-low temperature until expiry, may refrigerate up to 10 weeks within expiry period)• No ancillary kits included with single-dose vial orders

Moderna Shelf Life Extension

Moderna Shelf Life Extension

FDA has approved a shelf-life extension for the following Moderna10 products, which have been extended by three months. Below, find a table with updated expiration dates for the specific lots impacted by the extension. For the most current information, please visit the Moderna website.

With the Moderna Vial Expiration Checker, Moderna also allows vaccine providers to look up expiration dates by lot number, which includes the new expiration dates listed above. To find the expiration date, locate the lot number printed on the carton and/or vial and enter it into the lot number search field on the website, then press “submit.”
For additional information, view the CDC overview of Moderna vaccine.

Matchmaking Program Coming to an End

Matchmaking Program Coming to an End

The Philadelphia Department of Public Health’s COVID-19 Matchmaking Program would like to send a huge thank you for your time, commitment, and expertise you’ve given in partnering with vaccination clinics to provide vaccine. After careful consideration, we have determined to end the program effective November 4, 2022. 57 vaccination clinics were successfully matched for the duration of PDPH’s COVID-19 Matchmaking Program, and 77 providers were enrolled. These vaccinations clinics included community-based clinics, health fairs, and cultural events to name a few!If patients are looking to get vaccinated at their earliest convenience, you may direct them to use this link to find a facility in close proximity to them. Again, we thank you for your contributions and efforts to partner with vaccinations clinics to serve vaccine. You have made an immense difference through your dedication and continued support!

Health Department Publishes Request for Proposal for HIV Testing in Pharmacies

Health Department Publishes Request for Proposal for HIV Testing in Pharmacies

PHILADELPHIA—The Health Department is making four to six grants of up to $75,000 available to increase the availability of low-barrier HIV testing and connection to care services in select priority zip codes in Philadelphia. The request for proposals is part of the Health Department’s community-driven Plan to End the HIV Epidemic in Philadelphia, which envisions decreasing new HIV infections by 75% by 2025 and by 90% by 2030. Grant submissions may be made by applicants who operate pharmacies in the listed priority zip codes, and may address HIV testing, information distribution, linkage to care, and participation in training.

The accessibility of pharmacies for HIV testing presents a unique opportunity for pharmacists to contribute to the identification of undiagnosed HIV. An estimated 90% of urban consumers live within two miles of a pharmacy. A CDC-funded feasibility study offering rapid, point-of-care testing in community pharmacies and retail clinics found that pharmacies and retail clinics represent a vast, largely untapped potential for the delivery of HIV testing in settings that are more accessible and, for some people, less stigmatizing than traditional testing.

With this RFP, the Health Department’s goal is to expand opportunities for HIV testing in neighborhoods in Philadelphia with the highest incidence of persons newly diagnosed with HIV in 2019 through community-based retail pharmacies.

Eligible applicants are independent and non-independent pharmacies currently operating in the priority areas listed in this request for proposals or with appropriate justification and prior approval of the Department in an immediately adjacent ZIP code neighborhood. Based on local analysis of recent data on HIV testing, newly diagnosed HIV, and HIV testing resources by zip code, the Health Department has identified 13 priority zip codes for this RFP.  

To learn more about the request for proposals, all documentation is available on the eContractPhilly website, under Opportunity 21221013101712. The Health Department’s Community Plan to End the HIV Epidemic in Philadelphia can be downloaded here. 

V-Safe for Monkeypox Vaccine: Survey to Assess Promotion Willingness and Perceived Barriers

V-Safe for Monkeypox Vaccine: Survey to Assess Promotion Willingness and Perceived Barriers

The Immunization Safety Office at CDC will soon be going live with a monkeypox module in CDC’s v-safe After Vaccination Health Checker. V-safe is a voluntary smartphone-based system that uses text messaging and web surveys to provide personalized and confidential health check-ins. Participants can tell CDC how they, or their child or dependent, feel after they receive a monkeypox vaccine.Based on the success of v-safe for COVID-19, the CDC has found that promoting and encouraging enrollment at the vaccine delivery site is the best way to make vaccine recipients aware of v-safe. Please fill out this short survey to assess willingness and perceived barriers to promotion of v-safe at your practice.

 

Temperature Reporting for Online Vaccine Ordering

Temperature Reporting for Online Vaccine Ordering

Temperature logs must be submitted on the same day as any order placed for federal vaccine (VFC, VFAAR, flu, COVID-19, or monkeypox)!

Temperature logs are to be uploaded in PhilaVax and emailed to tempcheck@phila.gov. The logs must show that the unit is within the appropriate temperature ranges and that there have been no alarms. This reporting guide can assist you in submitting your DDL temperature files.

For more information on ordering and how to upload your temperature log, please attend the next online ordering training on November 10, 2022 from 10:00AM – 11:00AM EST. Click the link below to register for the training.

Register: Online Ordering Training

If your site uses a privately purchased DDL or cannot upload in PhilaVax, please contact tempcheck@phila.gov.

Thank you for keeping Philadelphia safe and healthy! 

Become a Monkeypox Vaccine Provider

Become a Monkeypox Vaccine Provider 

Does your pharmacy see patients who are at a higher risk of monkeypox infection? If so, please consider becoming a Jynneos vaccine provider and help stop the spread of monkeypox infection. The current patient eligibility guidelines are as follows:
People who meet the following conditions: 
  • Gay, bisexual, transgender, non-binary, and other men who have sex with men, transgender, or non-binary persons
AND meet one of the following criteria: 
  • Have had multiple or anonymous sex partners in the last 14 days
  • Have had any newly diagnosed STI in the past 12 months, including gonorrhea, chlamydia, early syphilis, or HIV
  • Have recently attended or plan to attend any venue where anonymous sex or sex with multiple partners will occur (e.g. saunas, bathhouses, sex clubs, sex parties)
  • Have met recent partners or plan to meet new partners through social media platforms (such as Grindr, Tinder or Scruff), or at clubs, raves, sex parties, saunas
Additionally, the following people are eligible: 
  • Sex workers (of any sex or gender), and/or
  • Anyone with known close contact (skin-to-skin) with someone with monkeypox in the past 14 days
If your patients are eligible for the monkeypox vaccine, we encourage you to enroll as a Jynneos vaccine provider. The Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act (PREP) now includes liability coverage for pharmacists for countermeasures against smallpox (variola virus), monkeypox virus, and other orthopoxviruses. Read the monkeypox PREP FAQ.
Note: this vaccine is administered intradermally, and may require some additional training of staff to administer appropriately.
Please complete the enrollment form if your site is interested in offering Jynneos vaccine.
Please reach out to Kenya Mack at Kenya.Mack@phila.gov or Jillian Brown at Jillian.Brown@phila.gov with any questions.