HCW flu vaccine rate hits record high
Most want to protect themselves
More hospital employees than ever are receiving the influenza vaccine. A national survey shows that by mid-November, about 78% of them had been vaccinated a rate that is almost double the rate of about five years ago.
Yet pressure continues to build for hospitals to boost their rates higher. A subgroup of the National Vaccine Advisory Committee issued draft recommendations in December that call for health care employers to "strongly consider a policy of employer requirement for influenza immunization" if they have not achieved a 90% vaccination rate. NVAC, which advises the secretary of Health and Human Services, is scheduled to meet Feb. 7. (The draft report and recommendations are available at http://1.usa.gov/wL60wk)
Influenza vaccination rates will be publicly reported as a quality measure by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, starting in 2013. And the Joint Commission accrediting agency revised its influenza vaccination standard to require hospitals to improve vaccination rates annually "with a goal of achieving the 90% rate established in the national influenza initiatives for 2020."
"We're always pleased to see vaccination rates going up among all health care personnel," says Megan Lindley, MPH, an epidemiologist with National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which sponsored the survey. "We'd like the rates to continue to rise toward the Healthy People 2020 goal [of 90%] and to be higher in other health care settings."
The highest vaccination rates were among physicians and dentists (77.6%), nurse practitioners and physician assistants (76.8%) and nurses (58.7%). Long-term care facilities had the lowest flu vaccination rates, at 45.1%. The online survey of about 2,500 health care workers took place in early to mid-November, so the numbers could climb slightly by the end of the influenza season, Lindley says.
"I do think this is an encouraging report card," says William Schaffner, MD, chair of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN, and president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.
"We are doing better in having health care workers accept the vaccine," he says. "We're doing better in having the [health] systems offering and providing the vaccine in a way that's persuasive and [easily accessible]. That said, it's clear that we still have a substantial challenge ahead of us."
One in six HCWs face mandate
The push for a 90% flu vaccination rate has led a growing number of hospitals to implement mandatory policies. About one in six (17.3%) of all health care workers said their employers required them to receive the vaccine but the proportion may be significantly higher in hospitals.
Meanwhile, the H1N1 pandemic may have convinced health care workers that influenza can be a serious and even deadly illness. When asked why they received the flu vaccine, 81.5% of the health care workers responding to the survey said they wanted to protect themselves. Only 42.6% said they received the vaccine to protect their patients.
CDC recommends universal vaccination that everyone six months and older to get the flu vaccine. Flu shots are now widely available in grocery stores and pharmacies and the flu shot reminders are ubiquitous. "The message is getting out there about the importance of everybody getting the influenza vaccine to protect themselves," says Lindley.
Yet health care workers are also aware of the shortcomings of the flu vaccine. Of those who said they "will definitely not" get the flu vaccine, about a third (31.6%) said they "don't think flu shots work." CDC has recently acknowledged that, on average, the flu vaccine has an efficacy rate of about 59%.
Employee health professionals should be candid when health care workers ask about the vaccine's effectiveness, advises Schaffner. But they also should emphasize that the vaccine can prevent many cases of influenza and that it's the best way to protect yourself from flu, he says. "It prevents illness. It prevents complications such as pneumonia and hospitalization, and deaths," he says.
To boost vaccination rates, employee health professionals should check the vaccination status of employees they see for other reasons, and they should continue to offer the vaccine throughout the flu season, Schaffner says. "If you are industrious, I would wager you could improve your institutional immunization rate by at least 10% by that mechanism alone," he says.
More hospital employees than ever are receiving the influenza vaccine. A national survey shows that by mid-November, about 78% of them had been vaccinated a rate that is almost double the rate of about five years ago.You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
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