By Chrissie Moreno Smith, RN, MSN, Clinical Nurse Educator-Pediatric Acute Care, Institute for Nursing Excellence and Erin Andersen, RN, NP, Administrative Director, UCSF Occupational Health Services
This has been a record year for all departments associated with the Flu Shot Program and UCSF nurses have been the backbone of this effort.
The Flu Deputy program was conceived as a method several years ago to increase compliance by offering flu shots to employees directly on their units. There were a total of 136 UCSF nurses who attended the Flu Corral Kickoff on October 2nd and these nurses became our Flu Deputies, offering anyone with a UCSF badge a flu vaccine. Chrissie Moreno Smith states: “I get the flu shot to protect myself, my family, and my patients from getting the flu. It is my responsibility as a health care worker to prevent the spread of illness to others. That’s why I get vaccinated.”
The Flu Deputy program has been a key piece of our efforts to reach the Medical Center’s Quality and Safety goal of 95% or greater staff compliance with the influenza vaccination program. According to Erin Andersen, Administrative Director of OHS, “Through the partnership with OHS and the Institute of Nursing Excellence, we’ve increased the number of shots given by flu deputies from several hundred, when the program was first conceived, to the record number so far this year of 3553.” This number represents over double the vaccines that were given by Flu Deputies last year.
In addition to the Flu Deputies, there were also drop-in and outreach clinics where many more vaccines were given by five OHS nurses and a group of agency staff hired specifically for this purpose. Through this effort, a total of 14,727 shots have been given thus far through OHS.
A small number of flu shots were also given by nursing and pharmacy students in coordination with a student program called Operation Immunization, designed to assist UCSF students with experience in giving injections.
We would also like to also to thank our Mobile Nurses, Elaine Esler, Josephine Liu, and Deanna Sheeley, who dedicated their time to helping our employees get vaccinated. They were extremely proactive and flexible with this new role.
