Improving Willingness to Vaccinate Among Parents

Abstract

By Matthew Shook , Nursing ; Mitch Johnson , Nursing; Nicholas Siegert, Nursing ; Christabel Pieters, Nursing; Grace Wells, Nursing; Ryan Benson, Nursing

Advisor: Mohammad Othman

Presentation ID: 96

Abstract: Infant and childhood vaccine rates are not high enough to control vaccine preventable diseases, with outbreaks occurring even in high-income countries. The goal of our educational intervention is to increase the parents' knowledge level about the importance of vaccination and through identification of available resources to help overcome perceived barriers. Our team is conducting a remote educational intervention, because of the current pandemic, by sending out emails to the parents of students that contain a pretest questionnaire, a short presentation, and a posttest questionnaire, to assess their readiness to vaccinate their children. The pretest questionnaire will assess the current knowledge base parents have, perceived barriers and willingness to vaccinate their children and the post-intervention survey identifies if they are more or less willinging to vaccinate, if they can identify ways to overcome barriers, and their gained knowledge. The short presentation covers the benefits of vaccines, vaccination schedules, how vaccinations work, local walk-in vaccination clinics, how to enroll in the school-based vaccine clinic, and ways to cover the cost of vaccines. We hope that after the educational intervention, the willingness to vaccinate children will increase.