Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1380662
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 6 JUNE 2021 13 COMMERCIAL who used the service praised its user-friendliness and uncom- plicated structure," he said. Another portal, the my- health.gov.mt, which had been launched several years back, had a number of services added during the pandemic. Formosa said that one such new service provided users with the facil- ity to view the result of their COVID swab test. Comple- menting this was another ser- vice that sends registered users their swab test results by SMS or email. The last service that was launched as part of myHealth was designed for those people who preferred to be vaccinated by their private family doctor. "With this new service, people are able to go to the doctor of their choice, who will register them through myHealth prior to administering the vaccine", Formosa said. Buttigieg said that it was al- ways the Ministry's priority to ensure no one was left behind and that any service introduced was easily accessible by anyone. "And this is where I think MI- TA excelled," he said. "It would have been much simpler to de- sign services that only those with advanced knowledge of IT could access on their laptops or smartphones, but instead they delivered simple-to-use servic- es so that even someone with limited knowledge of technol- ogy could access their results through a simple SMS." Buttigieg said that another equally successful service was the Covid Alert Malta app, de- signed as a tracing app to alert users of any potential con- tact they might have had with someone positive to COVID, and which had been download- ed by more than 20% of the population. "If we only alerted one per- son of the possibility of having been in contact with someone who resulted positive to COV- ID, the system would already have been deemed a success," he said. "Having so many users sign up to the app meant that we were able to better control the spread of the virus." And the app now works in 16 Eu- ropean countries, making it an even more important tool in the fight against COVID. Formosa said that another major challenge was often the tight deadlines and timeframes within which they had to de- liver. "This was an extraordi- nary situation, and not some- thing we had been gearing up for a year or had all the time to design and test the services we needed to deliver," he said. "For everything, at most, we had between a week and a half to four weeks." He explained that after an initial meeting with the client, ie: The Ministry for Health, his team would then work to design a 'beta' version of the product; a working prototype that would not include all the features. Twice-weekly workshops would then be held to refine the product as needed before officially launching it for pub- lic use. We had to be practical and deliver each service within the pre-set timeframes. Buttigieg said MITA had de- livered on all it was asked by the ministry. "These are experienced peo- ple, fully committed to the service they provide," he said. "They were as excited about the projects as we were, and that says a lot about the level of service they provide and the products they turn out." Butti- gieg said that what added value to the whole exercise, was the fact that different technologies were used to provide the best possible tools for the public and professionals. The relationship between MITA and the Ministry was not born with the onset of COVID-19; indeed, for many years the two parties have been working together to provide the best services possible. As to the future, both agree that there is much more to be done. "I think consolidating many of our service offerings will be a priority," Buttigieg said. One such project – the National Electronic Health Record – will be crucial because a patient's history will finally be available in one central location, and this central location will include data from both the private and public healthcare providers. Formosa agreed this would be a crucial next step. "Being able to make patient data from all healthcare pro- viders available always with the consent of the patient would improve the continuation of care, that can only benefit the patient," he said. Vaccin.gov.mt, Covid Alert Malta, and myhealth have all become household names as people signed up to the different services that became available soon after the pandemic hit Malta