SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — The tens of thousands of San Diegans who received a COVID-19 vaccination through UC San Diego Health and its super stations can now access their digital record online.
UCSD Health announced Tuesday that it’s the first healthcare system in the United States to offer patients access to a secure online record, known as SMART Health Card, on its website through the MyUCSDChartpatient portal and MyUCSDHealth phone app.
“As far as we know, we’re the first in the U.S. to go live, but we know that others will follow, and we’re excited to pave the way and show the other possible use cases,” said Dr. Christopher Longhurst, Associate Chief Medical Officer for UCSD Health. “Everybody who came in through RIMAC, Petco Park, and other UCSD Health vaccination sites has the ability to log in and get this; that also includes all of our students and employees across UC San Diego.”
You can log into the patient portal, click on the menu, and then the COVID-19 option to access the digital record.
Your vaccination status is then available through a QR code and a PDF, making verification quick and easy.
UCSD Health said the information on the SMART health cards follows HIPAA privacy guidelines.
“The QR code contains the same thing that your card might contain, your name, date of birth, vaccine information, or in case of a test result, your test information,” explained Longhurst.
It should not contain your phone number, address, government-issued identifier, or any other health information.
“We expect to see a SMART health card verifier in the app store very soon that would scan these, but make sure none of the data is collected, harnessed, recorded,” said Longhurst.
California is also giving people the option to sign up through the California Department of Public Health websiteto access their vaccination records online by filling out a few questions here.
"This is the same specification that California rolled out," he said. “As the governor said really clearly, this is not mandatory; this is really for the convenience of patients, students, and employees, it’s not mandated."
Longhurst expects the system to be more widely used soon.
“It would be exciting, for example, to see the state of Hawaii use it for travel testing or Uber to use it so that you can safely unmask when getting a rideshare,” he said. “As a practicing pediatrician, one of the things I’m most excited about is not verifying COVID vaccinations, but verifying all sorts of vaccinations, so imagine being able to register your child for school or summer camp or university without having to pull out all of those yellow cards.”
