Preparing Health Profession Students to Address Vaccine Hesitancy.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Public Health
• Vaccinology

Background:

• Health profession students are crucial for vaccination initiatives.
• Assessing educational interventions is key to improving vaccine communication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate a longitudinal community-based program's effect on health profession students' knowledge and self-confidence.
• To enhance students' ability to provide evidence-based vaccine resources and address hesitancy.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective cohort study involving 181 interprofessional health profession students.
• Asynchronous didactic curriculum focused on vaccine education and hesitancy, delivered in 2023.
• Pre-test and post-test assessments to measure changes in knowledge and confidence.

Main Results:

• Statistically significant improvements in understanding of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine and addressing vaccine hesitancy.
• Participants found the didactic content engaging, particularly the embedded videos.
• Positive feedback highlighted the program's relevance and effectiveness.

Conclusions:

• Targeted education effectively boosts health profession students' vaccine knowledge and public health engagement.
• Curricular enhancements are needed to cover complex topics like parent-provider communication and broader vaccine hesitancy issues beyond HPV.