Experience with individual receipt confirmation system and the university primary mail service

Before experiencing last year's H1N1 pandemic, we had happened to realize the need for a reliable communication method to provide all staff members and students with information about disease and emergency situations. Our legacy mail system was good for sending information, but it was difficult for the sender to get receipt confirmation. In July 2009, we introduced a new mail delivery system providing an official mail address to all the staff members in our university. In addition, we implemented a new system to send e-mails to all staff members and students and to receive the confirmation that the e-mail had been read. Now it is possible for us to send e-mail according to a specified campus or position code such as professor, part time staff, and students. The e-mail recipients are expected to respond to it by clicking the URL in the message text. The system records the user responses by the ID number, event code, time, etc. into the database. Students are expected to answer the questionnaire followed by the confirmation page. The questionnaire asks the whether a student has become infected with the influenza, about recovery, if they belong to clubs, their class schedule, etc. if so. It makes it possible for us to grasp the individual's situation and to get the information to contact them.