Info Via Social Media Apps May Increase Vaccine Acceptance
TUESDAY, Nov. 7, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- Providing women with web-based vaccine information with social media applications during pregnancy is associated with a greater proportion of infants up-to-date on their vaccines, according to a study published online Nov. 6 in Pediatrics.
Jason M. Glanz, Ph.D., from Kaiser Permanente Colorado in Denver, and colleagues randomly assigned 888 pregnant women (in a 3-to-2-to-1 ratio) to a website with vaccine information and interactive social media components (VSM), a website with vaccine information (VI), or usual care (UC) in order to assess whether the interventions increase early childhood immunization from birth to age 200 days.
The researchers found that mean ranks for days undervaccinated were significantly lower in the VSM arm versus UC (P = 0.02), but not statistically different between the VI and UC (P = 0.08) or the VSM and VI arms (P = 0.63). The proportions of infants up-to-date at age 200 days were 92.5 in the VSM arm, 91.3 in the VI arm, and 86.6 in the UC group. In the VSM arm, infants were more likely to be up-to-date versus infants in the UC arm (odds ratio [OR], 1.92; 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 1.07 to 3.47). However, up-to-date status did not statistically differ between the VI and UC arms (OR, 1.62; 95 percent CI, 0.87 to 3) or between the VSM and VI arms (OR, 1.19, 95 percent CI, 0.7 to 2.03).
"Providing web-based vaccine information with social media applications during pregnancy can positively influence parental vaccine behaviors," conclude the authors.
