To efficiently and accurately capture approximately ten million vital records and convert them to digital images, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH), Registry of Vital Records and Statistics (RVRS), recognized the need to establish secure processes. The way to ultimately provide three key benefits: an efficient way to store and retrieve the documents, identity verification for Medicaid (MassHealth), and establishment of an electronic disaster recovery program will be paved by converting these paper documents and capturing their information content.

To implement a more efficient and effective way to conduct searches pertaining to births, register of Vital Records and Statistics for the Commonwealth, Stanley E. Nyberg, had a goal. The Commonwealth currently collects, validates, processes, preserves and issues copies of birth, death and marriage records that have taken place in Massachusetts. Core public health data is also processed and collected RVRS to be used by DPH for healthcare policy and researchers studying the health of Massachusetts citizens.

Being both handwritten and typed, the vital records consist of approximately 5 million birth certificates from the years 1935-1987, 4.5 million death certificates from 1935-present, and 500,000 amendments from 1935 to present. Many of the records have been environmentally damaged. To transform an estimated ten million vital records into digital images, and capture hundreds of millions of data characters with near flawless accuracy to build a corresponding index file, the document conversion solution by DataBank will leverage the latest tools and technology. To the Department of Public Health's EMC/Documentum system, the complete collection of images and information will be delivered. From there, authorized users will be able to search, retrieve, and print scanned images depending on the level of security they have been granted.