Influenza vaccination in medical and nursing students in the COVID-19 era

how to improve it?

Abstract

Background: Influenza vaccination coverages among health care students are low. The aim of this study was to find out which measures, according to medical and nursing students, could contribute to improve these vaccination rates.

Methods: A cross-sectional study that included medical and nursing students of the University of Zaragoza who were doing internships in health centers during the 2020-2021 school year. The information was obtained in December 2020 by a self-administered online questionnaire, in which they were asked to describe the measures that, in their opinion, are necessary to increase their influenza vaccination coverage. A qualitative analysis of the content of the answers was carried out, extracting themes, sub-themes and selecting the most representative verbatims.

Results: The questionnaire was answered by 83 students (response rate: 5.9%); 64 (77.1%) were women, and 74.7% of them were studying medicine. The main measures proposed were improving the accessibility of the vaccine, improving the training on influenza vaccine, promoting vaccination by the teaching staff, and increasing the diffusion of information about the vaccination campaign.

Conclusions: This study has found measures to be applied specifically to medical and nursing students to potentially improve their influenza vaccination coverage. For its implementation, collaboration between universities and health services is necessary.