Improving Healthcare Worker Flu Vaccination Rates

Poland² emphasizes the importance of immunization to be offered to HCWs not just in the fall, but from October through January and beyond, a recommendation from the CDC. “What we are really talking about is a paradigm shift,” says Schaffner. “As the number of people who need to get vaccinated has been expanded by public health officials, so has the time-frame for vaccination. Vaccines given later in the year or even into the New Year are still beneficial in helping people avoid this serious illness.”

Schaffner writes, “The CDC and other health experts have slightly differing definitions of the influenza vaccination season. Although administration of influenza vaccine in October and November is traditional, it has become clear that full implementation of CDC recommendations cannot be accomplished if vaccination occurs only in the fall, in advance of the influenza season. The CDC and others advocate broadening the influenza vaccination season, such that patients are immunized even after influenza activity has begun in a community.”¹

Based on CDC recommendations, influenza disease season is defined as October through May, and the influenza vaccination season as October into January and beyond. “This shift in the vaccination timing paradigm requests all healthcare professionals to recognize the value and medical need of vaccines given throughout the season and to vaccinate at-risk patients at every opportunity,” Schaffner writes.¹

In February, the CDC expanded its recommendations for annual influenza immunization to include all children 6 months through 18 years of age. The new recommendation is to take effect as soon as feasible, but no later than the 2009-2010 influenza season. The change will add about 30 million children to the total number of people for whom CDC recommends annual influenza vaccination. Schaffner writes, “It is abundantly clear that we cannot vaccinate everyone in a two- to three-month vaccination window. Since influenza usually peaks around February in the U.S., vaccination given in December and later continues to be medically relevant.”¹