Prevalence and Determinants of Vaccine Hesitancy and Vaccines Recommendation Discrepancies among General Practitioners in French-Speaking Parts of Belgium.

Cathy Gobert,Pascal Semaille,Pierre Verger,Nicolas Dauby,Thierry Van Der Schueren

doi:10.3390/vaccines9070771

Cathy Gobert, Pascal Semaille + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/vaccines9070771

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Abstract

General practitioners (GPs) play a critical role in patient acceptance of vaccination. Vaccine hesitancy (VH) is a growing phenomenon in the general population but also affects GPs. Few data exist on VH among GPs. The objectives of this analysis of a population of GPs in the Belgian Wallonia-Brussels Federation (WBF) were to: (1) determine the prevalence and the features of VH, (2) identify the correlates, and (3) estimate the discrepancy in vaccination’s behaviors between the GPs’ children and the recommendations made to their patients. An online survey was carried out among the population of general practitioners practicing in the WBF between 7 January and 18 March 2020. A hierarchical cluster analysis was carried out based on various dimensions of vaccine hesitancy: perception of the risks and the usefulness of vaccines as well as vaccine recommendations for their patients. A total of 251 GPs answered the survey. The average percentage of moderate to high vaccine hesitancy was 50.6%. Three factors were independently associated with increased risk of vaccine hesitancy: an age <50 years old, having no children, and having no contact with selected vaccine-preventable disease (measles, complicated influenza, chronic hepatitis B (HBV), bacterial meningitis, or cervical cancer) in the past 5 years. VH was associated with controversies on vaccines’ safety. GPs who had vaccinated their children against six diseases (MMR, meningococcus C (MenC), HBV, and HPV) tended not to recommend the same vaccines to their patients. Among GPs with all children vaccinated against HBV, only 37.5% recommended catch-up HBV immunization to their patients. In this small cohort of GP, moderate to high VH was associated with controversies on vaccines’ safety and with specific personal characteristics (age <50, no children, and no recent experience with a serious VPD). As previously reported, GPs have different vaccine prescription attitude toward their patients and children. These findings should be confirmed in larger cohorts.

Highlights

IntroductionVaccination is a simple and effective means of protecting against certain potentially fatal diseases
Three factors were independently associated with increased risk of vaccine hesitancy: an age
As compared to the General practitioners (GPs) reported in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation (WBF) in 2018, there was a higher proportion of women and GPs < 50 years old represented (Supplementary Table S1)

Summary

Introduction

Vaccination is a simple and effective means of protecting against certain potentially fatal diseases. Vaccination provides both individual and community protection for certain vaccine-preventable diseases and has broad societal impact that includes increased productivity, positive fiscal impact, and decreased antibiotic consumption [1]. In order to avoid the resurgence of vaccine-preventable diseases (VPD), it is necessary to keep a sufficiently high vaccination coverage. In Belgium, only the polio vaccine is currently compulsory [2]. Vaccination coverage in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation (WBF), the two French-speaking regions of Belgium, for measles–mumps–rubella (MMR) and for human papillomavirus (HPV)

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