To battle the Coronavirus, the administration of the Province of Lower Austrian faced with the challenge of quickly developing a reliable and flexible digital solution for the exchange of COVID-19 relevant data in its region. With the Magic xpa technology deployed in just seven days, relevant authorities can now quickly and efficiently act on the data collected.
The government of Lower Austria is the highest administrative body of the Austrian federal state of Lower Austria. In addition to its daily administrative duties, the Lower Austrian Provincial Administration is responsible for combating the COVID-19 virus in coordination with the federal government and district administrative authorities.
To efficiently limit the virus’s spread and impact, the decision-makers require real-time collection of all the necessary data from doctors, hospitals, laboratories, federal and state authorities. To enable timely and coordinated response to the crisis, all the necessary Coronavirus data from multiple data sources must be quickly made available to all public health authorities.
Connecting IT systems at multiple levels of government to limit COVID-19 spread in Austria
At the state level, the Lower Austrian state administration was faced with the challenge of quickly developing a reliable and flexible digital solution for the exchange of relevant COVID-19 data in its region. The system had to seamlessly integrate and connect with the federal government’s and others’ digital systems, such as the local EMS (Epidemiological Reporting System) IT system.
Going live after just seven days of development
To achieve real-time, seamless exchange of information on COVID-19 between relevant authorities, the Lower Austrian state administration developed the client-server solution “MEPI application” (Meldung Epidemiologisches Informations system) in just seven days.
The solution was made accessible to public health officers and Lower Austrian district administrative authorities to empower relevant decision-makers by making all the necessary real-time data available, making a coordinated and agile response to combat the COVID-19 virus possible.
Integrating various data sources and creating a digitized process for seamless data flow
A central requirement for the technical implementation was to integrate a large number of different data sources from discrete IT systems at various public sector organizations. This included a central software system of the Lower Austrian State Health Agency, PDF files of the laboratories, Excel and XML files of various hospitals and authorities, and the connection to the state’s electronic file processing (ELAK) the preparation of notifications.
Data flows had to be optimized, uniform structures and statistics had to be created.
Coordinated COVID-19 response with Magic xpa
The new “MEPI application” was programmed internally by an IT specialist with Magic xpa and an SQL database.
After a development time of only seven working days, the Lower Austrian state administration went live with the new “MEPI application ” for a district administration authority and the staff department in the Lower Austrian state administration.
Five days later, all 20 district teams and the staff department were already working with the application. The second version with numerous functional enhancements was rolled out on May 5, 2020 and the application has been continuously expanded since then.
Enabling agile response to the COVID-19 health crisis
This digitalization measure enables responsible persons to create meaningful corona cluster analyses in order to make data-based decisions very quickly. That “MEPI application” allows authorities to:
- Provide necessary COVID-19 data to public health officers and authorities
- Automate data exchange of laboratory findings
- Connecting the application to the electronic file management of the state of Lower Austria (ELAK)
- Create uniform statistics: merge data flows, optimize data flows, and create efficient structures
- Unify statistics and visualize corona cluster evaluations
“The current corona situation required a digital solution that could be implemented quickly with a highly flexible scope for adaptation, for example, to the relevant legal requirements regarding COVID-19. With the Magic xpa technology we were able to implement all requirements optimally, we remain agile and capable of acting”. Ing. Reinhold Baumann, Office of the Lower Austrian Provincial Government, Dept. Information Technologie in St. Pölten, Austria.
The MEPI project for Lower Austria was successfully implemented in just seven days. The user-friendly interface ensured seamless and quick adoption, with 1,100 public authority employees across 20 district teams, and four magistrates are currently using the application to coordinate COVID-19 response.
All required COVID-19 data is now digitally captured, merged, distributed, processed, and analyzed. The seamless data flow prevents scatter and quality loss. With the Magic xpa technology, IT can act during live operation and quickly fulfill user requests, and the government can quickly and efficiently act on the data collected.
Magic xpa has enabled the Lower Austrian provincial government to supercharge their COVID-19 crisis response. Want to learn how Magic xpa can empower your organization to solve its business challenges through digital transformation?
