Review articleImproving adolescent health: Focus on HPV vaccine acceptance
Section snippets
Knowledge and attitudes about HPV
It is well established that adult as well as adolescent women have limited understanding of HPV [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13]. In two United Kingdom studies, only 30% of women participants had ever heard of HPV [10], [12] and in a Canadian study only 13% of adolescents had heard of HPV [9]. Similarly, among a sample of university students in the United States, 37% had ever heard of HPV [13]. Although research with patients attending health clinics in the United States found more encouraging
HPV vaccination: personal acceptability
Clearly, adolescent and adult women are concerned about HPV and want to be better informed about infection, transmission, screening, and prevention. However, this desire for education about HPV does not imply that an HPV vaccine will be widely accepted by women. Given that HPV is an STI, potential barriers to vaccine acceptance may include the stigma associated with STIs and the possibility that acceptance of the vaccine may be seen as an admission of risky sexual behavior [7]. Although HPV
HPV vaccination: parental acceptability
The research summarized in the previous section suggests that most women are interested in HPV vaccines; however, given the fact that HPV vaccines are prophylactic, and will provide the greatest public health benefit prior to infection with the virus, the major targets of HPV vaccination campaigns should be pre- and early adolescents. Research on hepatitis B vaccination indicates that adolescents look to their parents for guidance around vaccination issues [22]. Moreover, parental consent most
Health care providers
Health care providers are important sources of information and parents value physician recommendations about health-related matters, including vaccines. The success of HPV vaccination programs, therefore, will depend on physicians’ willingness and ability to recommend HPV vaccines to their patients. This will undoubtedly involve developing skills to effectively communicate the advantages of vaccination to adolescents and their parents.
Three research studies have been published on health care
Other HPV issues
Genital HPV infection is the most common STI, with high incidence and prevalence rates [39], [40], [41], [42]. HPV infections that cause warts are, from a medical standpoint, relatively benign. Furthermore, infections with high-risk, oncogenic types are usually either spontaneously cleared or regress to an undetectable level [43], [44], [45]. HPV, therefore, is a common sexually transmitted infection, but a less common sexually transmitted disease. To encourage vaccination, it is important to
Provider recommendations
The body of research described in this article should reassure physicians and other clinicians who have concerns about offering or recommending HPV vaccination to their preadolescent and adolescent patients. Women want more information on HPV for themselves and their daughters and value information provided by health care providers, suggesting that physicians will have an important role in educating adolescent patients and their parents about HPV and HPV vaccination. The research also indicates
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