Crafting Effective Messages for ER Workers

It may all be in how you say it. That’s what a new study reveals about the need to get emergency room workers vaccinated to protect against a disease pandemic.

“In the wake of 9/11 and the anthrax attacks, the government tried to implement a program to vaccinate 500,000 healthcare workers against the smallpox virus, which theoretically could be used in a bioterror attack,” lead researcher Sarah Bass, Ph.D., M.P.H., assistant professor of public health at Temple’s College of Health Professions was quoted as saying. “But it was left to each state to run the program, and each did so differently. As a result, less than 40,000 ER workers nationwide were vaccinated,” said Bass.

Using a unique method called “perceptual mapping,” researchers found that today, with no threat of an attack, ER workers would only be inclined to get vaccinated if they first got a recommendation from a trusted source, such as another hospital or healthcare professional. “States that crafted messages around the endorsement of a trusted source were able to get more healthcare workers vaccinated,” said Bass. “But we see that the messages needs to shift if an outbreak is imminent: that workers need the vaccination to stay alive.”

For the study, researchers first asked 73 emergency room workers at hospitals in the Philadelphia area to rate the importance of various aspects of the smallpox vaccination in four separate scenarios. Data from the surveys was then used to create the perceptual maps, a technique often used by marketers and politicians. “This data will help public health officials craft effective messages according to specific scenarios,” said Bass.

SOURCE: Temple University

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