Improving influenza and pneumococcal vaccination uptake among incident peritoneal dialysis patients: a quality...

Influenza and pneumococcal vaccination rates among peritoneal dialysis (PD) patients remain suboptimal, despite availability of vaccinations and health recommendations.

The primary aim was to improve influenza and pneumococcal vaccination rates among incident PD patients at our center to 80%. A secondary aim was to develop a sustainable workflow for vaccination in PD patients.

A quality improvement (QI) initiative to increase vaccination rate among incident PD patients was conducted in a tertiary care hospital in Singapore from Jul 2017 to Dec 2018. Key drivers and barriers to success were identified through root cause analysis. Change ideas focusing on improving opportunities, access and enhancement of reminder systems were implemented using Plan-Do-Study-Act methodology. Vaccination rates were monitored at 3-month intervals.

Total of 249 patients were eligible for vaccination. The baseline vaccination rate for influenza, pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV13) and pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine (PPSV23) were 63%, 54% and 14%, respectively. Root-cause analyses revealed several practice-related barriers, including lack of physician recommendation, time constraints and ineffective reminder systems. Multifaceted interventions, such as the provision of vaccination at non-traditional clinical settings, physician audit and feedback, utilisation of reminder tools, successfully increased influenza, PCV13 and PPSV23 vaccination rates to 86%, 85% and 63%, respectively.

A robust influenza and pneumococcal vaccination program implemented using a standardized QI methodology and multidisciplinary approach is effective in improving and sustaining influenza and pneumococcal vaccination uptake among PD patients.