AWS Public Sector Blog
AWS Health Equity Initiative accelerates modern public health access with SmartTracker
Jose Dueñas grew up in South Florida, the son of migrant working parents who knew what it meant to navigate a health system that wasn’t built for families like theirs. Long waits, language barriers, stacks of disconnected paperwork, and missed appointments because reaching the clinic was too difficult were regular features of his childhood experience with the healthcare system. Challenges like these can often determine whether a family ends up in crisis or gets the help they need in time.
After 16 years as a technology architect redesigning large-scale health and human services electronic health record (EHR) systems, Dueñas recognized that many of these barriers were baked into the technology. Public health departments across the United States were working to protect vulnerable populations from disease outbreaks while relying on fragmented legacy systems that weren’t designed for the speed and complexity the modern public health environment demands. Paper-based intake, manual referral processes, and disconnected data silos trapped critical health information in systems that couldn’t communicate with one another.
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed these gaps at an unprecedented scale. Spreadsheets and standalone databases buckled under the simultaneous demands of patient registration, vaccine tracking, and real-time reporting, making it clear that incremental fixes weren’t sufficient. Addressing the crisis required modern cloud infrastructure, purpose-built software, and the institutional commitment to match.
Dueñas founded SmartTracker to meet that need. It’s a modern, cost-effective solution designed specifically for public sector health organizations operating with limited budgets and small teams. Built entirely on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Dueñas created SmartTracker for departments that serve communities like the one he grew up in.
In 2025, AWS recognized the importance of that mission by selecting SmartTracker for the AWS Health Equity Initiative, a commitment to supporting organizations developing solutions to advance health equity worldwide.
From emergency response to everyday operations
SmartTracker is a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)-compliant health and human services solution that unifies real-time disease surveillance, outbreak detection, case management, vaccine tracking, and contact tracing in a single system. With SmartTracker, health departments can track, report, and share data across their entire operation without the manual handoffs and siloed workflows that slow traditional systems down.
SmartTracker’s impact is most visible in how quickly public health organizations can respond when conditions change. The Kansas City Health Department (KCHD), which serves more than 500,000 residents, is one of the company’s most compelling proof points. When Mpox emerged as a public health concern, KCHD used SmartTracker to configure vaccine events within days, including patient self-registration, electronic consents, and automated appointment reminders.
When KCHD needed Ebola monitoring, SmartTracker deployed a tracking system in 7 days. When measles resurfaced nationally, KCHD was already prepared, running outbreak detection, case management, and communicable disease tracking on the same solution that had powered their COVID-19 and Mpox responses.
“SmartTracker is an excellent tool for public health emergency preparedness,” says Tobias Liu, administrative officer of communicable disease and public health preparedness at KHCD. “By deploying SmartTracker for our COVID vaccine rollout, we were able to register patients, complete screenings, and schedule appointments without the need for dedicated staff support. During our Mpox response, we expanded the functionality to allow for symptom tracking and case management by our epidemiologists.”
The same solution supports daily operations across the full spectrum of public health services, from clinic scheduling with patient self-service and program management to vaccine and supply inventory, billing and reimbursement, and automated email and SMS outreach powered by Amazon Simple Email Service (Amazon SES) and AWS End User Messaging, which are configurable to meet state and federal reporting requirements. Every form and communication automatically converts to the patient’s preferred language at registration.
That flexibility extends to implementation. When The SPOT, a youth-centered health clinic operated by the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, urgently needed a modern EHR system with specialized workflows and sufficient administrative capacity, SmartTracker delivered a fully customized deployment in 90 days. An intelligent self-scheduling engine guides patients through a brief intake before booking, automatically routing them to the correct service and collecting all required consents and documentation electronically.
“On day one, it was amazing to watch the schedule fill up without the phones ringing,” says Allison Phad, coordinator of quality improvement at The SPOT. “The SmartTracker team answered every question and resolved every issue during go-live. We couldn’t have done it without them.”
Recognized by AWS, certified for the future
The collaboration between SmartTracker and AWS extends beyond credentials. Powered by AWS through cloud computing credits, architectural guidance, and hands-on technical expertise, SmartTracker has the infrastructure and insight to build what public health departments actually need faster and at greater scale than would otherwise be possible.
That support is powering the development of SmartTalk, a telehealth tool to deliver more secure video consultations, encrypted video storage, and medication administration tracking. Amazon Transcribe handles automated transcription, and Amazon Bedrock generates clinical insights from patient interactions. Together, these capabilities address the gaps in access, documentation, and treatment compliance that can arise when serving rural and low-income populations.
SmartTracker has also achieved the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC) for Health Information Technology Certification of Health in IT, meeting the critical federal compliance standards for interoperability with healthcare providers and state registries. This positions SmartTracker to deliver direct registry connections for real-time public health reporting and transition care across providers.
Infrastructure as a mission
Dueñas set out to build something the market hadn’t prioritized: modern, cost-effective technology built for the public health organizations that serve overlooked communities. SmartTracker is the result of that commitment, shaped as much by his personal experience as his technical expertise.
AWS has been central to building that vision. Cloud computing credits removed the financial barriers that have historically kept enterprise-grade infrastructure out of reach for public sector organizations. Architectural guidance and hands-on technical expertise have accelerated development at every stage, from the core solution to SmartTalk. With AWS, SmartTracker has the building blocks to deliver capabilities that would otherwise require resources beyond what a mission-driven startup could sustain.
“We’re not trying to replace the systems built for large hospital networks,” Dueñas says. “We’re trying to make sure that a county health department with a fraction of the budget can still protect its community with modern, real-time technology. That’s the mission.”
For public health organizations looking to modernize their operations and expand access to care, SmartTracker demonstrates what becomes possible when mission-driven software is built on AWS.