Victoria’s first pfizer clinic delivers 500th pfizer vaccine

Victoria’s first Pfizer clinic is this week expected to deliver its 500th Pfizer vaccine since it was first established on 19 May.

cohealth’s Laverton clinic was the only GP-led clinic in Victoria and one of only three GP-led clinics nationally selected by the Federal Government to deliver Pfizer outside of the centralised hubs.

The cohealth Laverton clinic also operates as a testing site, and a dual vaccine clinic, meaning people can get both Pfizer and Astra Zeneca.

cohealth Chief Executive, Nicole Bartholomeusz, says the demand for COVID vaccines has risen tenfold since the new COVID outbreaks, and that GP-led clinics have now demonstrated that they can be one stop shops to support roll-out of multiple vaccines.

“We’re proud that cohealth was chosen to be the first GP provider to deliver Pfizer in Victoria,” said Ms Bartholomeusz.

“It’s a real vote of confidence in us as trusted health partners and community health experts.

“But more importantly it allowed us to respond to the need of the community in the west of Melbourne who have trust and confidence in cohealth. Community members might not otherwise be able to get the vaccine due to language barriers, low health literacy or other disadvantage,” she said.

The Laverton clinic operates as an appointment-only service, and with two clinical rooms operating simultaneously, has the capacity to administer up to 80 Pfizer vaccines per day and up to 80 Astra Zeneca vaccines per day. Due to the high demand for Pfizer, there is currently a two-week wait.

Working onsite every day at the cohealth Laverton clinic are two community nurses, one GP and two customer service officers.

Ms Bartholomeusz has said that delivering both Astra Zeneca and Pfizer from the one site has required the development and implementation of a strict set of workflows and processes.

“The vaccines are stored in separate fridges to ensure that the vaccines are kept separate , and we do block appointments of Pfizer in the morning, and Astra Zeneca in the afternoon, followed by a 2-hour block of COVID testing at the end of the day. We have shown it can be done,” said Ms Bartholomeusz.

cohealth’s Laverton clinic is at 95-105 Railway Ave, Laverton.

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More information: email media@cohealth.org.au or call 0499 101 638

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cohealth is a Victorian not-for-profit community health organisation that strives to improve health and wellbeing for all. It provides universal access to services as well as targeted programs and assertive models to address the health disparities experienced by disadvantaged groups. cohealth offers a broad range of high quality, integrated health and support services, including medical oral, pharmacy, mental health and drug and alcohol services.