Jessie Johnson
University of Calgary, Qatar
Title: Nurses working in primary care perceived immunization knowledge, attitudes and practices in Qatar
Biography
Biography: Jessie Johnson
Abstract
Educating a health workforce that can safely handle and provide reliable information is essential to immunization coverage rates for protecting a population from vaccine-avoidable diseases. Although Qatar's immunization compliance rate for many vaccines is above 90%. Literature has showed that nurses were found to have varying degrees of education on vaccinations. To date no formal research in Qatar has explored the Knowledge Attitudes and Practices (KAP) of Primary Health Care Corporation (PHCC) nurses before and after structured immunization education. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to gain insight and provide baseline data for future educational needs for PHCC nursing workforce to deliver quality immunization information for patients living in Qatar. Mixed methods were used to asses (KAP) regarding nurses working in vaccination clinics within the primary care setting. A ‘vaccination training course’ was developed and delivered for these nurses working in immunization/vaccination clinics. Pre and post-surveys were conducted on all participants to glean their KAP before and after content delivery. After hands on experience in the clinical setting the researcher set out to glean KAP by conducting face to face interviews on a random sample of participants using interpretive description. The research demonstrated that a comprehensive training program geared towards nurses was needed to be successful in educating and administering vaccines to children and adults.