Eligible priority groups can pre-register for the vaccination at the Region of Waterloo website. Please do not call the University of Waterloo Health Services clinic for vaccination appointments.
The School of Pharmacy is actively supporting the COVID-19 vaccine effort in the Waterloo Region and across Ontario.
Training student vaccinators
Our pharmacy students can play an active role in supporting COVID-19 vaccine efforts in the coming months. We are committed to injection training for our students to ensure that they can participate in the mass inoculation efforts that are planned throughout the province. Currently all our fourth year students and the majority of our third year students (approx. 240 students) are certified immunizers. We have plans in place to certify our second year students in early May when they return to class. That will mean that 360 students (three out of four cohorts) are certified to administer any vaccine, including COVID-19. We are also working with the Ontario College of Pharmacists to explore alternate pathways for injection certification for our first-year students and/or other ways they can assist in the vaccine effort.
Sharing opportunities to vaccinate
As certified immunizers, our students will be able to administer COVID-19 vaccines while on co-op, on clinical rotation, in part-time work and in a volunteer capacity. We are receiving requests for students to assist with various planned efforts within Waterloo Region and beyond. It is important to note that most of our students are not currently living in the region. They are living and working in regions across Ontario and will continue to do so in the spring term.
We encourage our students to contribute and are preparing a roster of opportunities from which our students can choose to participate. While participation is voluntary, we have adapted our curriculum so that students who participate will receive credit towards the community service learning and/or interprofessional education milestones required for graduation.
If you would like to add your site to our vaccination opportunities roster, please fill out a COVID-19 Vaccination Assistance Request Form.
Supporting our local community
Additional efforts underway include:
- We provide materials for healthcare professionals and the public to share COVID-19 and vaccine related information.
- We have graduate students, faculty and staff who are certified immunizers and who may also be part of the vaccine rollout.
- We will be supporting the Centre for Family Medicine, Family Health Team’s vaccine clinics.
- Kelly Grindrod, Ontario College of Pharmacy Professor in Pharmacy Innovation and Associate Professor, is the pharmacy lead on the Waterloo Region Vaccine Task Force. Her role is to engage with the pharmacy community to help connect them with public health. She is currently working on embedding pharmacists in various regional committees (mobile clinics, mass immunization clinics, primary care, etc) and is currently recruiting pharmacists, interns and techs to help with mobile clinics.
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Ken Manson is a member of the Pharmacy Vaccine Working Group which supports the Waterloo Region Vaccine Task Force. This group includes representation from all areas of pharmacy practice and makes recommendations on pharmacist involvement in the vaccine rollout plan in Waterloo Region.
- Several pharmacy practice researchers are collaborating to examine the role of pharmacists and pharmacy technicians in immunizations
- Sherilyn Houle, Assistant Professor, collaborated with the Ontario Pharmacists Association to modify the pharmacists’ injections and immunizations certificate program for pharmacy technicians, to meet the necessary competencies for them to be able to administer the COVID-19 vaccine.