Nurses play an essential role in the immunization of older adults. Due to their training, their roles as health care workers and their interaction with the patients play an indispensable role in addressing older patients' immunization in their communities. They take the lead in improving the vaccination rates within their organization and community. The following are ways in which nurses can impact older patients to vaccines and their effects on society.
A registered nurse should be on the lead by being up to date with all vaccines. With the electronic health record's help, A nurse can provide information when a drug is needed. Immunization is the greatest triumph against illnesses. As a nurse, I should act as immunization champions by immunizing the elderly as their immunization is underutilized. Adult immunization, therefore, is a global priority as it ensures healthy aging ( Aguado et al., 2018). Adult immunization will help protect themselves, families, patients, and their colleagues against meningitis, among others.
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A registered nurse can explore systemic changes to promote adult immunization. One can organize pre-visit planning to ensure any adult misses no vaccinations in their community since they are a multidisciplinary team focusing even on disease control ( Doherty et al., 2018) . The one on one talks with the older adults will enable the nurses to offer proper guidance and education. In line with these changes in the system, they can organize databases that capture all older adults' information in their society and do a follow up in the immunization and vaccinations. Immunization will, therefore, help reduce the rates of contraction of some preventable infections.
A nurse should be allowed to assess and vaccinate patients during their annual wellness visits without necessarily clinicians' presence. It will ensure that older adults can easily access these vaccinations, thereby saving time ( Busby 2018) . The assistance ensure that immunization and vaccination or the older adults always occurs. This immunization will therefore prevent the high numbers of people contracting diseases like flu, pneumonia, meningitis, among other conditions that one can be immunized against
A Nurse can work with the marketing departments to promote and encourage the immunizations of older people. Using the available tools, health providers can make brochures listing all available local vaccinations for adults to ensure they can find them locally. The information is vital as it educates the elderly members of society on the merits of vaccinations, thereby increasing the community's immunization rates, hence decreasing the mortality rates.
The use of standing orders can also increase adult immunization. The state allows a nurse to assess the patient’s physical needs without an individual’s physical demands since the national vaccines advisory committee advises on the assessment of vaccines at every patient encounter. Standard orders can help stock all needed vaccines even if it does not stock all the recommended list ( Wright et al., 2019) . With the ease of access, it becomes much more comfortable for older adults to avail themselves of the vaccination.
As evident above, a nurse plays a vital role in increasing the immunization rates among the elderly members. Withstanding orders, use of marketing strategies, a change in the entry of data accessibility, their position in the care team in the US health care system, and their training and skills as nurses, they are in the best position to play a leading role of improving the immunization rates among the older adults in the country.
References
Aguado, M. T., Barratt, J., Beard, J. R., Blomberg, B. B., Chen, W. H., Hickling, J., ... & Friede, M. (2018). Report on WHO meeting on immunization in older adults: Geneva, Switzerland, 22–23 March 2017. Vaccine , 36 (7), 921-931.
Busby, C. (2018). Not just for kids: how to improve adult vaccination uptake in Canada. CD Howe Institute Commentary , 509 .
Doherty, T. M., Connolly, M. P., Del Giudice, G., Flamaing, J., Goronzy, J. J., Grubeck-Loebenstein, B., ... & Schaffner, W. (2018). Vaccination programs for older adults in an era of demographic change. European geriatric medicine , 9 (3), 289-300.
Wright, W. L., Bruns, D. P., Feeney, A. S., & Strowman, S. R. (2019). Improving vaccination rates in older adults: A quality improvement project. The Nurse Practitioner , 44 (4), 40-49.
