Quality improvement initiative boosts early HPV vaccine rates

A multipronged primary care quality improvement initiative increases early human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine initiation across racial/ethnic, sociodemographic, insurance, and geographic groups, according to a study presented at the annual meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies, held from May 2 to 6 in Toronto.

Caitlin Miller, from Nemours Children’s Health in Delaware Valley, Delaware, and colleagues analyzed trends in early HPV initiation by race/ethnicity, geography, insurance, and child opportunity index. The analysis included data from a primary care network serving 130,000 children.

The researchers found that HPV Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set rate significantly improved annually from a baseline of 49.2% in 2019 to 59.5% in 2022. Similarly, early HPV initiation (at 9 and 10 years of age) significantly improved from a baseline of 12.7% in 2019 to 34.8% in 2022.

For each racial/ethnic group, early HPV initiation improved significantly from 2019 to 2022. The proportion of patients with early HPV initiation significantly increased for both those covered by Medicaid (19.5% in 2019 to 46.2% in 2022) and non-Medicaid insurance (8.8 to 39.9%). Early HPV initiation significantly increased for both rural residents (1.8% in 2019 to 33.1% in 2022) and for urban patients (13.7 to 42.7%). Across all child opportunity index levels, early HPV initiation increased.

“This multipronged quality improvement approach was instrumental in increasing early HPV initiation in populations with the lowest HPV rates in 2019, such as in rural, Asian, White, and privately insured patients,” the authors write.

Copyright © 2024 HealthDay. All rights reserved.