Are your patients fully vaccinated?

As providers, you know how important it is to ensure everyone has been administered the proper vaccinations at the proper time. Vaccination is considered one of the most important public health achievements of the 20th century and continues to offer great promise in the 21st century. Vaccines save lives and improve quality of life by preventing serious infectious diseases and their consequences. However, the benefits of vaccination are not realized equally across the U.S. population. Adult vaccination rates remain low in the United States, and significant racial and ethnic disparities also exist.

Vaccine Goals

The US Department of Health and Human Services’ National Adult Immunization Plan (NAIP) has established four key goals:

• Goal 1: Strengthen the adult immunization infrastructure
• Goal 2: Improve access to adult vaccines
• Goal 3: Increase community demand for adult immunizations
• Goal 4: Foster innovation in adult vaccine development and vaccination-related technologies

There are groups of people that may have had a severe allergic reaction (e.g., anaphylaxis) after a previous dose or to a vaccine component. Here are some of the various components of a vaccine:

• Aluminum salts
• Oily compound
• MPL, purified fat-like substance
• Soap bark
• Antibiotics, however, antibiotics most likely to cause severe allergic reactions (e.g., penicillins, cephalosporins, and sulfa drugs) are not used in vaccine production, and therefore are not contained in vaccines.
• Formaldehyde, which is also produced naturally in the human body as a part of normal functions to produce energy and build the basic materials required for the important life process, such as amino acids, which are the building blocks of proteins that the body requires.
• Sugars, amino acids, and proteins are also added to some vaccines as stabilizers. These are encountered in everyday life in our diet and are components that are in the body naturally.
  
  

Regardless of patient avoidance and anxiety to receiving a vaccination, we must do our best to educate and encourage patients to obtain them.  

Please note: An article is being sent to members this month regarding required vaccines; the article encourages members to discuss this at their upcoming appointments.