Mass Vitals makes public health data more accessible and secure by using AI for file intake and extraction
Massachusetts Registry of Vital Records and Statistics
Overview
Massachusetts Registry of Vital Records and Statistics is responsible for maintaining and issuing copies of vital records.
These documents, including statistics on births, deaths, divorces, and marriages, are used to understand the population, promote wellness, and ensure health equity within the commonwealth.
Challenges
The Registry is responsible for maintaining decades worth of physical records and information that the public can request at any time. Due to the sheer and ever-growing quantity of data and documents that the department must maintain, it lends itself to some key challenges that impact employee efficiency and record request response time.
The average time spent to manually locate, retrieve and copy each record request was 10 minutes.
Documents were only available in a physical format that had to be accessed by a time-consuming, manual indexing process.
Physical documents were at risk of damage from daily wear, theft, and natural disasters.
Solution Full-Service AI-Powered Document Processing and content management system implementation
The Mass Vitals team utilized DataBank’s AI-Powered Document Processing solution to create a secure and fully automated system to replace their manual indexing, including a searchable portal to quickly find records.
Today, the portal is used by their team to efficiently locate digital records, cutting public request times dramatically.
Discovery
Together, we discussed their goals to modernize their records retrieval process, reduce records request time, and increase employee productivity.
File receipt
DataBank built an on-site intake process to manage all scanning and imaging.
Prep
Digital files were transferred to an AWS-powered, cloud-based tool.
Processing
AI and machine learning technology captured, classified, and labeled key data points like names, birth dates, and marriage dates.
Validation
Any data point that didn't meet the confidence rating set by the Mass Vitals teams was moved into a queue system for human verification.
Delivery
Validated data was pushed directly into the secure, cloud-based enterprise content management system and portal.
Disaster avoided
Following implementation, a pipe burst in the vault, compromising hundreds of indexing books and birth and death records.
Fortunately, due to the foresight of the Massachusetts Vitals and DataBank teams, the solution was already in place before disaster struck, allowing quick action that preserved thousands of documents that otherwise could have been damaged or destroyed.
Within three weeks of the incident, the Registry could locate its compromised documents digitally in its new environment.
Results
By structuring and validating critical data points for these records, the Registry cut down manual document search and retrieval time from 10 minutes per search to 3 minutes or less.
The portal, developed by DataBank's Custom Development team, has also given staff better accessibility to the records without compromising security and compliance and adds additional protection against risks like information loss or destruction.
Over time, AI & machine learning improve the process, meaning their results are more consistently accurate as the system learns and understands more of their records.
70% decrease in record retrieval time
Decrease in records search and retrieval time from 10 minutes to 3 minutes or less
Quick, accessible information
Greater document accessibility for employees across the agency
Better security
Improved document security and compliance with implementation of an enterprise content management system
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This project has been the most successful project by far. They’ve dealt with unforeseen anomalies more than once and delivered without asking for a change order. “Easy to work with” is an understatement.
Robert Lebel, Project Manager Massachusetts Registry of Vital Records and Statistics
Vision
Following the organization, preservation, and increased accessibility of these documents, the Registry now has an opportunity to discover trends throughout the data that can uncover profound insights into its population.
This includes understanding trends in causes of death, discovering potential investments in healthcare, and promoting overall population wellness for years to come.
GET MORE INFO
Learn more about DataBank’s AI-Powered Document Processing from a public sector specialist.
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