BETHESDA, MD 01 April 2010—For the first time ever, the influenza vaccination rate for health care workers may have met the Healthy People 2010 goal, according to preliminary data released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Overall, 61.9% of health care workers surveyed were vaccinated against seasonal influenza between August 2009 and mid-January 2010, according to CDC`s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) for April 2. That figure surpasses the Healthy People 2010 target of 60% and improves upon the typical vaccination rate of <50% that CDC has reported in past flu seasons.
Influenza Resources For important information about seasonal and pandemic influenza, visit ASHP`s H1N1 Flu Resource Center, the Stop the flu—it starts with you! resource center, and the ASHP Foundation`s Pandemic Influenza Assessment Tool for Health-System Pharmacy Departments.
The new data were gathered in January by the nonprofit RAND Corporation, which has been conducting monthly online surveys of vaccination rates for CDC during the 2009–10 flu season, according to the agency. A total of 1417 health care workers responded to the recent survey.
The preliminary findings are consistent with vaccination rates reported by RAND earlier during this flu season.
CDC cautioned that it is not yet known whether the RAND results will be consistent with the final data from Healthy People 2010, which are obtained using a different survey method.
According to the RAND data, hospitals achieved a seasonal influenza vaccination rate of 71.7%, the highest of any health care setting. Among health professionals, physicians, physician’s assistants, nurse practitioners, and dentists as a group achieved the highest vaccination rate, 76%.
Pharmacists were grouped with allied health professionals, a population that achieved a 61.3% vaccination rate for seasonal influenza.
The RAND survey also assessed the uptake of monovalent H1N1 vaccine among health care workers. Overall, 37.1% of those surveyed reported being vaccinated against H1N1, and an additional 10% said they planned to get vaccinated against the virus.
As with seasonal influenza, vaccination against H1N1 was higher at hospitals than in other settings. In all, 50.6% of respondents from hospitals reported receiving an H1N1 vaccine.
A total of 34.7% of health care workers reported receiving both a trivalent and an H1N1 vaccine.
According to CDC, 11.1% of respondents said their employers required health care workers to be vaccinated against seasonal influenza for the 2009–10 flu season, and 65.4% recommended that employees get vaccinated. A total of 8.4% worked in a setting that required H1N1 vaccination for workers, and 61.8% worked at a site that recommended vaccination.
The seasonal influenza vaccination rate was 97.6%, and H1N1 vaccination rate was 87%, at work sites where vaccination was mandatory, according to the report. CDC stated that an influenza vaccine requirement likely boosts uptake of the vaccines by workers.
The agency recommends that health care administrators take steps now to sustain gains in influenza vaccination rates for health care workers. Specifically, CDC recommended defining vaccination coverage for health care workers as a measure of patient safety and quality assurance; tracking coverage levels by ward, unit, and worker occupation; and identifying factors that improve vaccination coverage rates and building on those factors for next season.
