The University of Utah COVID-19 incident management team will begin sending a COVID-19 Health Check each week via SMS and email to the campus community (excepting some clinical personnel). The purpose of the Health Check is to help us remember that a primary factor in battling COVID-19 is to observe our own health regularly and take protective actions when necessary.

To that end will we use a simple polling feature that is part of our Campus Alert system. A link will come to your mobile number and primary email registered for crisis notification. The link opens a custom web page with a list of symptoms you may have experienced. Answer the poll by clicking a symptom. If you have more than one, choose the symptom that concerns you the most or is strongest. If you have no symptoms, select that choice. Information submitted is kept private and confidential.

We determined that a daily symptom checker would create too much message fatigue for our campus community. However, a weekly poll will a) reaffirm to students, faculty and staff to do a daily health check on their own and b) reaffirm our overall guidance to “stay home if you are sick” and “report if you have symptoms or exposure.”