Is a Family Doctors' and Nurses' Training a Good Way for Changing Their Attitude Towards Covid-19 Vaccination?

Pavlo Kolesnyk, Oksana Ilkov, Marianna Kozhanova, Andriy Kolesnyk, Olga Rusanovska, Taras Mykyta, Olexander Sabov, George Kuodza

Keywords: COVID-19, interatcive training, readiness, vaccination

Background:
COVID-19 vaccination was launched in March 2021 in Ukraine. The vaccination teams had to pass a mandatory 2 day training. The trainers of vaccination teams conducted training for healthcare workers all over the country. The low level of readiness for COVID-19 vaccination was observed in the population and also among healthcare workers.

Research questions:
To assess changes of family doctors' and nurses' attitude after the interactive training concerning vaccination against COVID-19

Method:
The interactive training was conducted for medical teams of 541 health workers (doctors and nurses) trained to provide COVID-19 vaccinations in Western Ukraine. Questionnaires to assess readiness of self-vaccination were used at the beginning and at the end of the training. The questionnaire was validated beforehand and consisted of questions in epidemiological data and a Lickert scale aimed to asses readiness for vaccination of the doctor\nurse on the scale from 1-5 (where grade 1 was "not ready" and grade 5 was "totally ready" to accept vaccination)
Training was conducted by 5 trainers who provided 5 training modules concerning practical and theoretical aspects of COVID-19 vaccination

Results:
The set of training was performed in 2021. The participants were divided to small groups of 20-30 and passed 2 days seminars. The seminars consisted of 5 interactive modules where used different interactive teaching methods as well as evidence based information about COVID-19 vaccination and management.
The difference in levels of readiness for vaccination given by participants was estimated before and after the training: the number of grades 1 decreased from 9% to 1%, grades 2 from 14% decreased to 5%, grades 3 from 57% to 23%. Accordingly, the number of grades 4 increased from 19% to 55% and grades 5 from 1% to 16 %..

Conclusions:
Analyzing the data, we achieved the significant difference in readiness for COVID-19 vaccination among healthcare professionals after the interactive training

Points for discussion:
Does the estimated level of readiness mean that healthcare workers are being vaccinated?

Will effect of provided training be the same in other regions or countries?