New FP panel aims to improve vaccination rates
Sometimes physicians find a curbside consultation invaluable. Hearing how colleagues navigate challenges can spark new questions, new solutions.
Such synergy came into play during the first meeting of AAFP's Immunization Collaborative Advisory Group. ICAG, a panel of 10 FPs, began meeting in March to discuss immunization issues. The panel explored, for example, where breakdowns may occur in achieving ideal vaccination rates. The FPs represent a cross-section of family doctors - male and female, urban and rural, from practices large and small. They will generate information, serving as the AAFP's eyes in the field - and indirectly, the CDC's.
One ICAG member said the AAFP had a lot to gain from the panel's discussions.
"This will get the Academy up to speed on the practical issues we're encountering," said Michael Hartsell, M.D., of Greeneville, Tenn., former president of the Tennessee AFP. "The day-to-day workings of office practice have tremendous competing agendas and pressures that can either successfully promote immunizations or, unfortunately, impede them."
The panel came about as a result of a cooperative agreement the CDC awarded AAFP in fall 2003. The agreement, "Strengthening the Immunization Message," is the first such collaboration between the AAFP and CDC.
As part of the agreement, the AAFP will create an annual report for the CDC, gleaning information from the advisory group.
At the inaugural meeting, ICAG participants discussed:
One of ICAG's tasks is to help develop a survey that will go to AAFP active members in the coming months. The instrument will probe to find out where members get their immunization news, whether physicians themselves get immunized against influenza and whether they require their staffs to be immunized.
The cooperative agreement between AAFP and CDC runs through September 2006.
To reach writer Toni Lapp, e-mail tlapp@aafp.org.
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Copyright © 2004 by
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