Requesting Medical Supplies

The Requesting process aims to accommodate ad-hoc requests for medical supplies. That is, this component of WIMEDS can be used by anyone that needs to urgently request medical supplies for NTDs from WHO. The Requesting Process is currently deployed and in production in the following link. Its main sub-components are shown in the figure below.

High level view of the tasks and their corresponding actors for the Requesting Process

Create Account (Requestor)

In order to be able to submit a request, a user needs to create an account in WIMEDS. This is done by filling the necessary information in the following link. A screenshot of the form to be filled is shown in the figure Create account. Once the form is completed the user receives an email with a link that needs to be clicked in order to activate the account.

Create account: the form used to allow users to create accounts that can request medical supplies.

Fill in and Submit Request (Requestor)

The task of submitting a new request starts with the requestor selecting the disease and the type of medicine to be requested. Next, the requestor is expected to fill-in a form which consists of three tabs: 1) Selecting the health facility for which the disease is requested. 2) Filling in information about the medical supply requested and the patient for which the same is requested. 3) Uploading the necessary authorization documents that are required for the medical supply to be shipped to the country.

Medicine request form: consisting of three main tabs.

Health Facility

Medical supplies are requested on behalf of a health facility, therefore the requestor needs to select the health facility he/she is representing from the list of the already registered health facilities. However, if the health facility cannot be found on the list, he/she can add a new health facility under the corresponding administrative division (e.g., if the health facility is located in Barcelona, the user needs to locate the city of Barcelona and add the health facility under Barcelona). Finally, any additional consignment delivery details can be provided here too.

Select a registered health facility

In the figure below a screenshot corresponding to the form for selecting a registered health facility is shown.

Select health facility: selecting an already registered health facility.

Add a new health facility

If a health facility cannot be found on the list of the existing ones, it needs to be added manually. In the figure below we show a screenshot of the form that corresponds to the adding of the health facility. Note that the information with respect to the name and address of the health facility are mandatory.

Add a new health facility: inserting all the necessary information.

Consignment delivery details

In the last part of this tab some additional information with respect to the consignment delivery can be added. This information includes the shipping address (where the medical supplies need to be shipped), information about the department and unit of the requestor, and finally, information wrt whether the health facility already has an international courier account to cover the shipping costs. A screenshot of the form corresponding to this is shown below.

Consignment delivery details: insert additional information wrt the consignment delivery.

Fill in Medicine and Patient Information

After having completed the information wrt the health facility, the user needs to continue filling the second tab, which is related to data about the medicine and the patient. Some of the information requested is mandatory. For instance, the age and weight of the patient, the medicine requested, its quantity, and the phase of the disease. Given this information, the system is able to provide the correct prescription for a given medicine (i.e., the recommended quantity). In the figure below, a screenshot of this form is shown.

Fill in medicine and patient information: inserting all the mandatory information.

Upload Documents required for Shipment

Some documents are necessary for the shipment of medicines. These can be authorization (approval) to import the medicines in the country or any other document required for customs. The necessary documents can be uploaded in the third tab of the form, as shown in the figure below.

Documents required for shipment: authorization documents or any document required for customs.

Submit Request

Finally, when all the necessary fields inside the three tabs are completed, the requestor clicks the 'Submit Request' button, which shows him a pop up window with all the information inserted. This is the time to check if the inserted data is correct. Furthermore, the system performs an automatic validation of the quantity of the medicines requested and therefore if the quantity requested exceeds or is lower than the recommended quantity, the user is requested to write a justification. In the figure below a screenshot of the pop up window is shown.

Submit request: if the requested quantity exceeds or is lower than the recommended quantity, a justification must be provided.

Approve Request (WHO-HQ)

Once the request is submitted by the requestor, it is received at the WHO. An actor from WHO (e.g., Technical Officer) has now the task of approving the request by validating the three parts (represented as tabs in the form): i) the health facility selected (if it is a new health facility), ii) the information wrt the medicine and patient, iii) the shipment documents. Thus, similarly to the requestor, the WHO actor sees 3 tabs and therefore needs to approve each tab separately. Finally, a request is approved only if all the tabs are approved. On the other hand, if any given tab is not approved, the request is sent back to the requestor who is required to apply the necessary corrections and sent back the request (e.g., if some shipping document is missing). The comments and required corrections together with the link to the form are sent to the requestor by email. A screenshot of the form is shown below.

Request approval form: all the tabs need to be approved separately.

Create and Dispatch Shipment (WHO-HQ)

When the request is approved by the WHO actor, the procedure for creating and dispatching the shipment starts. That is, the shipment containing the quantity of the requested medicines together with the necessary documents are sent to the mailing office. The mailing office then dispatches the shipment and when this is done, an email is sent to the requestor with a link to a form that provides the necessary information about the shipment.

Confirm Shipment Reception (Requestor)

When a request is approved by the WHO, the requestor receives an acknowledgment email which confirms that the request has been approved and that a shipment is being prepared. When the shipment is ready to be dispatched from the WHO side, another email is sent to the requestor. This email contains the link to a form, which on one hand provides information wrt the shipment (e.g., estimated date of delivery and other information related to the courier), and on the other hand it allows the requestor to confirm (acknowledge) that the shipment has been received. Thus, when the shipment is received at the health facility the requestor can click 'Confirm' in order to automatically notify all the actors that the shipment has been received. A screenshot of the form is shown below.

Confirm shipment reception form: when the shipment has been received by the health facility.