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Monthly
Board Report
- March 2001
FLU Campaign Summary
Submitted by Jane
Futcher, Director Clinical
Services
As the flu immunization
campaign for 2000-2001 comes to an
end, it is time to look at the
successes we have had in promoting
and delivering influenza
immunization in Leeds, Grenville
and Lanark.
The 1999-2000 flu
campaign focused on the long-term
care facilities and the
immunization of their clients and
staff. The Ministry of Health had
set goals for immunization rates
at 100 % for residents and at 70 %
for staff. At the February 2000
Board of Health meeting, we
celebrated the successful
vaccination campaigns in the
long-term care facilities, nursing
and retirement homes. Twenty-six
of 30 (87%) facilities in the
health unit, including all 15 of
our long-term care facilities,
achieved staff immunization rates
of 70% or higher. The average rate
per facility was 91%.
At that time, we were
unable to predict the success of
the campaign in terms of illness
and death as the flu season was
still underway. However, in
September an article, describing
the Leeds, Grenville and Lanark
Health Unit experience about the
relationship between staff
immunization and rates of illness
and death was published in PHERO (
Public Health and Epidemiology
Report, Ontario).
Tables 1 and 2 illustrate
that, as the rates of staff
immunization in the Leeds,
Grenville and Lanark counties
increased, the number of
institutional outbreaks remained
fairly constant but attack rates
and rates of pneumonia,
hospitalization, and death
declined significantly.
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Table 1. Comparison
of LTCF staff immunization
rates,
outbreaks and duration,
1997-2000, LGLD Health Unit. |
|
Year |
Overall
Staff Immunization Rate |
Number of
InfluenzaOutbreaks |
Facilities
having an outbreakn, (%) |
AverageDuration
of Outbreak(days) |
|
97-98 |
15% |
8 |
8/33 (24) |
19.6 |
|
98-99 |
33% |
8 |
8/33 (24) |
21.5 |
|
99-00 |
91% |
7 |
7/34 (21) |
15.4 |
| Table 2. Number and
rates of influenza and
influenza complications in
LTCF residents, 1997-2000,
LGLD Health Unit. |
|
Number of
LTCF residents |
Influenza
Casesn, (rate per 1000) |
Cases of
Pneumonian, (rate per 1000) |
Number
Hospitalizedn, (rate per
1000) |
Deathsn,
(rate per 1000) |
|
3010 |
255 (84.7) |
40 (13.2) |
20 (6.6) |
29 (9.6) |
|
2961 |
204 (68.9) |
21 (7.1) |
9 (3.0) |
3 (1.0) |
|
2938 |
61 (20.1) |
6 (2.0) |
2 (0.7) |
2 (0.7) |
In July 2000, the
Ministry of Health announced its
intention to provide influenza
immunization to all residents in
Ontario, as part of its strategy
to relieve the pressures on the
hospital emergency departments
across the province.
This addition to our
original mandate to immunize the
"at risk" population, at
first seemed daunting. We didn't
want to lose the momentum that had
been generated in the long term
care facilities (LTCFs) by turning
our focus solely to the
immunization of the general
population.
The "out break"
team, staffed by PHIs and PHNs
continued to work with the LTCFs,
providing "in services"
for staff and support to the
infection control officers of the
facilities. They presented a work
shop Influenza: Prevention and
Control in September, which
included a panel discussion about
motivating staff to be immunized.
Its members were Kay Olmstead
& Sally MacInnis: Brockville
Psychiatric Hospital, Faye
Barkley: Maple View Lodge, Carey
Duncan: Stone Ridge Manor, Aileen
Conboy: Lanark Lodge and Carol
Martin: Rideau Regional Centre.
The 2000-2001 campaign
began with immunization clinics in
these facilities and the Health
Unit began with clinics for other
"at risk" individuals in
the community. At the March 2001
Board of Health Meeting, we will
be recognizing the 26 agencies,
who met the Ministry's goal for
staff immunization for the 2000-
2001 campaign. Of those meeting
this goal the average staff
immunization rate was 89 %.
The goal of the Ministry
of Health was an over all
influenza immunization rate of 70
% for the general population.
According to the survey of
"possibilities" done in
August we estimated that upwards
of 85,000 people in Leeds,
Grenville and Lanark would choose
to be immunized against influenza.
(At a population of approximately
158,000, this represents 55 % of
the total population). A full
report of the population coverage
by municipality will be given at
the March meeting of the Board of
Health. Data is being collected
from all the physicians in the
tri-county who administer vaccine,
the long-term care facilities,
acute and chronic care hospitals,
community health centres, private
nursing agencies, local businesses
who ran their own "work -
place" flu clinics. The scope
of the campaign and its success is
due to the cooperative effort of
all health care partners in the
tri-county. In particular, we
would like to recognize the Health
Unit Immunization Team who worked
long hours and travelled under
difficult conditions to ensure
that all communities in the
tri-county had easy access to
influenza immunization.
One of the most important
elements of a successful
partnership is the will to
evaluate the process and to make
the improvements suggested or
indicated by the assessment. We
choose to look at the campaign
from its inception, surveying
partners about their involvement,
from the planning process to the
delivery stage of immunization in
the community clinics. The results
of this evaluation will be shared
at the March Board meeting and
will be used in next year's
planning.
Results of the evaluation
and a full report of the
tri-county immunization coverage
will be found in the April Board
of Health Report. |
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