The evolving Safe Davao QR

DAVAO CITY- From a contact tracing only application during its early implementation, the Safe Davao QR Code (SDQR) has transformed into a full-scale tool utilized as Davao City's COVID-19 Management System.

A QR code for contact tracing was implemented in November last year when Executive Order 60 series of 2020 was issued by Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio. It provided the guidelines for a QR code for contact tracing. All Davao City residents and non-residents would need to register and get a QR code as this would allow entry to the city and movement within the city.

The deluge of registrants for the QR code overwhelmed the initial site and had to be temporarily shut down. The City Government then was assisted by ICT Davao- a local organization of ICT (information and communications technology) to help bring back the site and the QR system. Ingenuity, a Davao City-based full service software company was tapped for trouble-shooting and redevelopment. 

It was an IT bayanihan project of sorts as Ingenuity working together with the initial development team, ICT Davao- a local organization of ICT (information and communications technology) stakeholders, and the City Government  re-architected the app from the ground up to primarily address scalability, reliability, and security issues.

According to Jeremy Pacabis, Ingenuity Senior Software Engineer who oversees the project, the SDQR offers a wider range of health services as compared to the earliest implementation of the app. The new features also bring added convenience to the public as the bearers can use the SDQR for their swabbing and COVID-19 vaccination.

These new core features included:

Contact Tracing with tagging and notification – This is the core feature of SDQR at the beginning of its development is for the city to have a quick and easy way of contact tracing for people entering an establishment whenever one of them contracted the COVID-19 disease. A contact tracer will enter the DQR of the infected person and the system will list down all establishments and the people who are with the infected person in the same establishment during a time period.

Swabbing/Testing management - System will automatically send out swab schedules for the people who are with an infected person in the same establishment during a time period. The results will be fetched from another platform and displayed in the DQR profile of the users.

Vaccine pre-registration - Enables DQR users to pre-register for the initial vaccination roll-out.

Vaccine scheduling - DQR feature which allows users to select open vaccination slots at a specified schedule and vaccination site.

Vaccine Administration System, from scheduling up to report generation (VAS line list export/end of day report to be submitted to DOH VIMS-VAS) - Complete vaccination processing and data capture from vaccination scheduling for vaccination admins and users, to filling out of digital vaccination forms (consent form and health declaration screening form), saving digital vital signs for each patient, saving the vaccination card and also generating list of vaccinated and deferred individuals complete with other data to be submitted to the Department of Health Vaccine Information Management System-Vaccine Administration System.

Vaccine Passport/Digital Vaccination Card - A history of vaccination records for COVID-19 displayed in the DQR user profile

Person record validation - A way for a validator to check the submitted documents of individuals belonging to a certain sector such as senior citizens and persons with disabilities.

Pahalipay - system that facilitates giving gift packages to citizens of Davao City integrated to SDQR

“The SDQR system continues to evolve and more features are being added and integrated including Pahalipay, “ Pacabis said.

Pahalipay

“Pahalipay is a system that facilitates giving gift packages to citizens of Davao City, it basically manages and tracks gift package distribution to its residents. To check if you have received a Pahalipay package, just go to your SDQR profile and click the Pahalipay button. From there, you can check your Pahalipay details such as gift type, claim period, and supplier / place to claim. To redeem your Pahalipay, just go to your assigned supplier and let them scan your QR code,” explains Abi Sitjar Ong, Ingenuity software engineer and the Pahalipay Project Head.

Abi says the early challenge for the team was the timeline since Pahalipay was set to be released during the second week of December. 

“Development and testing took only a little over a month, but it took some time to validate and finalize the data of 1.8 million residents who would be the recipients of both the gift certificates and grocery packs. Setting the challenges aside, we’re really proud of the team for getting through this challenge and continuously trying to fix and improve Pahalipay along with the City Government,” Sitjar said.

She said it took some time to validate and finalize the list of valid recipients which totaled 1.8 million people and import the data into the system.

They were also able to resolve several complaints such as rewards being tagged as claimed even though they haven’t claimed it.

“This was caused by a feature fix which affected the gift retrieval workflow. This issue was resolved immediately and no Pahalipay gifts were compromised or claimed without the recipients’ notice,” Sitjar said.

As for the suggestion of many if the Pahalipay can be converted to donation for those devastated by Typhoon Odette, Sitjar said the Ingenuity team is now busy working on it and that feature will be out soon.

“The City Government has already given the go-signal to build and integrate this feature. The process for donating would be similar to the proposal made by the public.  Log-in on their SDQR profile click the Pahalipay button and they would be shown a “DONATE” button if they opt to donate their Pahalipay gifts to the typhoon victims,” Sitjar said.

And as of December 25 Christmas day, the donate button of the SDQR was already functioning with many Pahalipay beneficiaries donating their gift packs.

As for future features of the SDQR the developers say they will follow the lead of the City Government of Davao who owns the system with Ingenuity being the development partner. 

“We built the system, make sure it is running smoothly, and continue to add/integrate features as mandated by the City Government,” Sitjar said. (PIA/RG Alama)