Notice of Intent to Sole Source: VA701-16-N-0072 Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) Online Text Subscription Introduction: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Program Contracting Activity Central (PCAC) intends to issue a sole source contract to the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) for site licenses to the APIC Online Text of Infection Control and Epidemiology. Justification: The VHA National Infectious Diseases Program Office has identified the APIC Text Online as an authoritative and up-to-date resource that is relevant to the needs of ensuring infection control information is made available for patient care. At this time, there is no solicitation. If your company feels it can provide the requirements of the online subscription, please review the requirements below and provide a capability statement. Background: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Veterans Health Administration (VHA) requires an existing commercial off the shelf (COTS) based, APIC Text of Infection Control and Epidemiology product that will be made available throughout the VHA healthcare system. For the purposes of this notice, these products may also be referred to as bedside information tools because they have been designed to provide information at the patient's bedside, or point of care. They tend to provide information that will directly affect patient care. They can be a good source for background information. What distinguishes these products from sources such as electronic textbooks or bibliographic citations databases that may link to full text is this emphasis on point-of-care, patient-oriented information. These products are distinctly different from text-based, point-of-care sources such as printed guidelines; these electronic resources are updated much more frequently than print resources and that they provide tools for easily searching and sharing information. Currently, VHA utilizes the APIC Text Online resource on an Institution-wide basis. VHA's goal is to maintain uniform availability of a high quality, clinical, knowledge based resource across the VHA system for clinical decision making at the point of care. Requirements: Performance Period: One twelve (12) month Base Period with four (4) Options Year periods to be exercised. 1.0 Objectives To provide access to the resource in support of infection control and epidemiology direct patient care activities of VHA. 2.0 Information Quality 2.1. Information is accurate, authoritative, and relevant. 2.2. Authors and sources are well recognized subject experts in their fields. 2.3. Topics are presented succinctly, but with adequate detail to be useful to clinicians. 2.4. "Best practice" or evidence-based information is included in recommendations for diagnosis or therapy. 2.5. Policies for determining validity and standards for inclusion of material are well described. 2.6. Guidelines and summaries include references or sources. 2.7. When necessary to the topic, images, tables and diagrams are available and clearly shown. 3.0 Usability 3.1. Navigation within the system is logical and is easy to use. There is fast access to topics and subtopics. Topic linking or indexing retrieves material of high relevance quickly. 3.2. The product has "user friendly" help and direction aids. 4.0 Currency 4.1 The date a topic was last reviewed for content is stated and easily found. 5.0 Access, content, support 5.1 Product is 508 compliant. (http://www.section508.gov/) 5.1.1 If product is not 508 compliant, vendor must describe measures being taken to bring product into compliance and date, within 12 months of contract award, that product will be 508 compliant. OR 5.1.2. If product is not 508 compliant, vendor must describe why no work is being done to make it 508 compliant. 5.2. An unrestricted number of simultaneous users are to have immediate access from any computer within VA that has Internet access. It is required that all authorized remote use with VPN access have access to the product. A username and/or password option must be offered for remote users if needed. 5.3. The product is must be compatible with Internet Explorer and most standard web browsers, which have cookies enabled. To insure privacy, the product uses session cookies rather than persistent cookies. 5.4. The product is compatible with the Windows environment. 5.5. All site content and support of the web site is the responsibility of the contractor. This includes tech support to VA users nationwide. 5.6. System downtime is minimal and VA project manager is notified when such occurs. 5.7. Topics are easily printed. 5.8. The vendor must permit free use for educational purposes of all pictures and graphics. 5.9. Single point of contact for customer service issues is assigned to VA. 5.10. Questions are responded to on the same business day. 5.11. Usage statistics are available to the system administrator on an enterprise level. 5.12. The product shall be accessible via a variety of personal mobile devices including Blackberry, Apple and Android devices. 5.13 Graphics, pictures, and/or images that are searchable are highly desirable. 5.14 The contractor must offer training services. On an as requested basis, training session (web-based or live) will be set up to train VHA staff on use of the product. Specialized training sessions may be requested for VA library staff. 5.15. Availability of usage statistics at an IP level is highly desirable. 5.16. Topics can be emailed among VHA colleagues. Submittal Information: As stated above, this is an Intent to Sole Source. However, any responsible source who believes it is capable of meeting the requirement may submit a capability statement, proposal, or quotation, which shall be considered by the agency, only if received by the closing date and time of this notice. A determination not to compete the proposed requirement based upon the responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the government. Responses to this notice are due on or before April 20, 2016 to both Roberto De Jesus via email at
[email protected] and Anthony Wilson at
[email protected]. All responses must include the following information: Company name, Cage code, CCR number, Dun & Bradstreet number, Company address, Point of contact name, Phone number, Fax number, GSA contract (if applicable) and email. The subject line for correspondence should clearly display: VA701-16-N-0072.