Social Determinants of Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Uptake: An Assessment of Publicly Available Data.

Abstract

Despite cancer prevention benefits associated with the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, uptake in the United States is relatively low among males and females. Our objective was to use the Healthy People 2020 social determinants of health framework to determine the availability and characteristics of data on economic, educational, social, health care, and community factors affecting HPV vaccine uptake in the United States. We included the most recent data sets from 6 publicly available, US-based, federally funded surveys that contained at least 1 measure of HPV vaccination among adolescents and young adults. We searched each data set for any social determinants of health measures within the 5 domains of the framework: economic stability, education, social and community context, health and health care, and neighborhood and built environment. The social determinants of health domains of education, economic stability, and health and health care appeared in all data sets. The domains of social and community context and neighborhood and built environment appeared in only 3 data sets. Even when domains were represented, we discovered gaps in the data sets, in which only limited measures of the social determinants were available. The addition of questions about the social determinants of health to the surveys that generate these data sets, particularly in the domains of social and community context and neighborhood and built environment, would strengthen the ability of public health researchers, policy makers, and professionals to identify associations between the social determinants of health and HPV vaccine uptake.