PHPA_3017_Pre_-_Proposal_Conference_Minutes.pdf

Pre-Application Conference Minutes

REQUEST FOR APPLICATIONS (RFP): PARTNERSHIP TO INCREASE HUMAN PAPILLOMAVIRUS

(HPV) VACCINATION IN MARYLAND

Solicitation Number: PHPA 3017/BPM #046465

Date: October 10, 2024

Vendor Attendance:

Kristen Gwaltney, Total Health Care, Inc.

Alicia Berkowitz, Renay James Healthcare Advisors

Rock Schuler, Greater Baden Medical Services

Tracie Lefevre, Baltimore Medical System

MDH Staff

Sharmistha Mohapatra, Maryland Department of Health

Beverly Allen, Maryland Department of Health

Augustus Woyah, Maryland Department of Health

Greetings/Virtual Rules – Augustus Woyah, MDH

Attendees were advised that the virtual conference was being recorded and the virtual

Conference Rules were reviewed.

Greetings/Introductions – Augustus Woyah, Procurement Officer

Augustus Woyah, procurement officer, facilitated opening remarks and introductions. MDH staff and attendees introduced themselves. All attendees were asked to sign in using the “Chat” feature within the virtual meeting.

Procurement Overview – Augustus Woyah, Procurement Officer, MDH

The Department intends to make a single award. The anticipated duration of services to be provided under this Contract is ten months, starting on December 1, 2024, and ending on

September 30, 2025.

This solicitation is a Small Procurement, and the Maryland Department of Health’s Small

Procurement cap is $50,000.00

In order to receive a contract award from the Maryland Department of Health, a vendor must be registered on the eMaryland Marketplace Advantage (eMMA). Registration is free. Please review Section 1.6 of the RFP

Carefully review Section 1.7 Questions regarding how to submit questions. Questions to the

Procurement Officer shall be submitted through the email address listed on the RFP Key

Information Summary Sheet. Please identify in the subject line the Solicitation Number and

Title. Questions should be submitted no later than October 15, 2024, at 2:00 PM Eastern

Standard Time.

If the RFP is revised before proposals due date, the Department shall provide an Addendum.

Please be sure to check the eMMA website to acknowledge any Addendums.

POINTS EMPHASIZED:

A. The Contract resulting from this solicitation shall be a firm fixed price as defined in COMAR

21.06.03.02.

B. The Contractor’s Requirements: Scope of Work is listed in Section 3.2. This gives an outline of the responsibilities of the Offeror and provides you a clear understanding of what the

Department expects of the successful Offeror in the provision of the services. Please note that a program staff representative will discuss the Scope of Work in this meeting.

C. Proposal Format:

Offeror are required to submit their proposals in two parts. Section 4- Proposal Format, clearly lists all submission requirements.

o Volume I – Project Narrative o Volume II – Budget Narrative

Please note that no pricing information is to be included in the technical proposal.

D. The Evaluation Committee, Evaluation Criteria, and Selection Procedure are outlined in

Section 5. Your proposals will be evaluated by a committee organized for that purpose and will be based on the criteria set forth in the RFP.

E. The Technical Proposal Evaluation Criteria, listed in descending order of importance, can be found in Section 5.2, with the Financial Evaluation Criteria listed in Section 5.3. All

Qualified Offerors will be ranked from the lowest (most advantageous) to the highest (least advantageous).

RFP Attachments:

Exhibit B must be completed and submitted.

Exhibit C must be submitted with the Technical Proposal in the same document.

Attachment A- This is the contract sample, and it is not required to be submitted with the proposal.

Attachment B must be submitted with the Technical Proposal.

F. Other than composing your technical proposal and financial Proposal, the most important matter is to have your proposals submitted by the date and time listed. Your Proposal is due no later than October 22, 2024, at 2:00 PM EST Local Time and must be submitted electronically to the State's eMaryland Marketplace Advantage (eMMA).

No applications will be accepted after 2:00 PM

Participants were advised that after this Pre-Proposal Conference, offerors may have questions answered that may help them understand the RFP, etc. Please keep in mind that the answers to your questions, if they are significant in nature, will be posted on the eMMA website. Therefore, please allow sufficient time for this to occur.

Review of Contractor’s Requirements and Scope of Work – Sharmistha Mohapatra’s

Presentation Transcript.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: The Request for proposals is because we have certain jurisdictions in our state that have above average oral cancer incidents and cervical cancer incidents as well as mortality. So, this is not a statewide open call. We did actually look at our jurisdiction's specific data, so that's why we want to target these particular counties that have these high incidents and mortality rates of oral and cervical cancer. And one of the preventive ways of lowering that is by vaccinating for HPV. So let me go ahead and also share the maps that

I have.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: So, this is preliminary unpublished data we do have here-jurisdiction level rates. So you can kind of see here why we made the decisions of who should apply right based on who has above US rates of oral cancer incidents then we have.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: For oral cancer and then cervical cancer incidents and cervical cancer mortality. So that's why we picked the jurisdictions that we did. So, depending on where your organization operates, you can use this data to strengthen your case of why we should pick you because you're operating in those priority areas. let's see. Also.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: I will like to point to detailed level data at the jurisdiction level as well. So, I'm going to pull this up. so, this is on the NIH National Cancer Institute cancer profiles. And so again, you can kind of look up cancers by cervical or oral whatever, and you can kind of drill down to see your particular jurisdictions rates. So, you can kind of play around with that too if you wanted to look at it in particular, but all of this data is what we looked at to kind of make the case that we want to.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: Do this request for proposals and run this program. So let's go back to the RFP itself. apologies, I'm like going back and forth.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: All back to the RFP. So that's the reason why we picked these particular jurisdictions and we encourage you if you're operating in them to apply until again cite the data particular to where you're operating as your case and then also why HPV vaccine.

Another issue in this situation with HPV vaccination is that even though it's approved for

Children, the vaccination rate for it remains significantly below other childhood vaccination rates. So, that's another thing I'd like to share as well.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: I navigate through so many different screens. Okay.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: So again, all of this is hyperlinked in the RFP itself. So, here is a table that just shows how, our HPV vaccination in Maryland is so much lower than all the other childhood vaccinations. So there's a gap. This is a missed opportunity. It's not that they're just not getting vaccinated for HPV in particular. So, this is where we kind of encourage our primary care clinics, and our pediatrics offices to kind of help us close this gap. Let's raise the HPV vaccination rates so that it's commensurate with the other vaccinations that are happening;

they’re already showing up in the clinic. So, what is that hesitation? Obviously, I think we know what that hesitation is. People are associating if you vaccination with sexual activity, And that's the narrative that we need to kind of s***, right? this is cancer prevention in the long run, right?

So kind of like this is an opportunity to spend resources and time

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: To train providers and staff what is the proper narrative to encourage parents to get their children, vaccinated for HPV? So again, we don't think it's like they're anti-vaccine's just maybe this is a HPV specific that there's some kind of hesitation.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: So we'd like to use this, grant cycle as an opportunity, to kind of discuss best practices and things that we could do to kind of help your organization with a clinic improve on that. And so there's a list of evidence-based interventions again that the Community

Preventive Sources. Task forces identified specifically for vaccination, it doesn't drill down to

HPV but it's vaccination in general and then also, we have our Maryland Cancer Collaborative that has an HPV vaccination work group. So they've also identified some additional recommendations. So all of those recommendations are kind of rolled into this section here of the scope of work is, implement, these three things operate vaccinations starting at age 9. Have your providers make strong recommendations. We know that, if the

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: the primary care provider and the pediatrician is saying, Get vacs needed. people are more likely to follow through than, if they're not informed, or told or reminded. And then another thing is scheduling appointments for follow-up doses. So this is another tricky thing is, HPV vaccination requires two to three doses. So, completing the series is important to do and, we want again support your clinics in how to, strengthen those processes.

And so we think if you Have them showing up for one appointment. Make sure that they don't leave without scheduling the subsequent doses

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: So those are the three required processes that we would like you to implement and then there's, additional evidence-based interventions that you can have an option to pick. So again these additional ones here, come from that community guide as well as our issues vaccination work group. So, you can pick any of these additional ones. So, from home visits might be very difficult for You don't have to pick it but that was one of the recommendations, reducing clap out of pocket costs. So, some clinics have vaccine for children programs, So that could be, an additional way of eliminating a barrier for vaccination. We are throwing in here, providing client or family incentives.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: Because this is a particular evidence based situation for vaccination. So if you do want to select this, we are, kind of limiting it to only up to age 26 with maybe someone books or school supplies or something like that, but if you are gonna pick this, then, we do need you to provide a lot of Details on how you're going to track The incentives are stored them and disseminate them so that we don't have misuse of that other ones here are providing client reminders.

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: Using Immunet to kind of cross reference Vaccination status giving provider assessment feedback, that's kind of like scorecards for providers reminders. And the EMR for providers offering same device, vaccination partnering with pharmacies establishing and standing or these are these other options that you can think to kind of work on for this? Grant period to kind of again, develop your processes and strengthen that and hopefully get better at HP vaccination. so I don't think there's anything surprising here with staffing as far as reports go. Okay, this is what we're asking is just tracking the number of unique clients, that get doses. So we've broken it down by

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: Male and female. And the reason is because as I showed you on the earlier, vaccination table, that's how they have it down. So it's just why we asked for it broken down by the sexes. We also then broke it down by age because that I think will inform us as to, who's More inclined to get vaccinated. So the nine to 14, they need to only have two doses to complete the series. But above that, they need three doses. So that's why it was broken down that way the

Sharmistha Mohapatra -MDH-: Current recommendations are that up to 26, you should definitely get a vaccinated above that is kind of discussion with providers. So a few years ago I think it was the FDA kind of expanded the eligibility for issue of vaccination up to the age of 45.

It's not mandatory but at this age range it's kind of have a discussion with your provider so we kind of do that in here as well as sure if you want to vaccinate your older patient.