Optometry is a primary care profession. As such, it is our responsibility to provide front line health care to the limit of our professional licensure. In eight states, optometrists may administer vaccines. At the time of this writing, those states are California, Colorado, Kentucky, New York, Ohio, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia.
From a public health perspective, the value of annual vaccines against flu and COVID is dramatic. They play a critical role in reducing illness, hospitalizations and death while mitigating the economic impact of these infectious diseases.
Flu shots results in the US are now fully tabulated for the 2019-2020 flu season and prevented 7.5 million illnesses, 105,000 hospitalizations and 6,300 deaths.
According to the CDC, COVID-19 vaccines have prevented over 10 million infections and over 1 million hospitalizations since the initial rollout in 2020.
In addition to their direct benefit, these vaccines reduce the healthcare burden, and the economic impact. Flu vaccines alone reduce healthcare costs by an estimated $3.7 billion each year and decrease absenteeism from work and school.
Significant population vaccinations can even provide a level of protection for those who may not be candidates for direct vaccination by developing “Herd Immunity”. When a significant number of a population is vaccinated, the disease has less opportunity to spread. Until recently, diseases like polio and measles had been mostly eradicated in the United States by herd immunity. With the recent trend of vaccination hesitation, these diseases are making a comeback in certain areas of the country.
Another primary care health profession, that of pharmacy, started to offer flu vaccines in the mid 1990s. This started slowly but the 2009 H1N1 Pandemic ushered in a large uptick in pharmacy-based vaccines and in 2010, many states expanded the scope of pharmacy to include the administration of vaccines. Today, pharmacists provide over 50% of the flu and COVID vaccines in the United States. Pharmacy is an excellent option to expand this important public health service. People who use medicines are coming to the pharmacy to get their medication supply, it is easy enough to get your annual vaccines while you are there.
But what about people who don’t use medicines on a regular basis but who wear contact lenses or glasses? Would it not make perfect sense for these people to get their annual vaccines while getting their annual eye examination.
The vaccination rate for the state of Texas ranks below the national average. Only 64% of Texans are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 while the national average is 70%. States in New England like Rhode Island, Vermont and Connecticut have over 80% of their population fully vaccinated. As expected, the death rate from COVID in Texas is above the national average at 322 deaths per 100,000 residents.
This seems a paradox for Texans who normally pride themselves for exceptionalism to fall below the average for this important health care initiative. The latest Gallup poll indicated the nearly 70% of Texans believe that their state is in best place in the country to live.
It is time for Texas optometrists to “step up”. Follow the lead of the pharmacists and expand your scope of practice to include vaccinations. Make the annual vaccination for flu and COVID to be part of the annual eye exam. Other vaccines are in the pipeline. These include Bird Flu, Cancer, Norovirus and even Glaucoma.
Get prepared and get ready to offer the full scope of primary health care services.