Primary care physicians' strategies for addressing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy.

OBJECTIVE

To explore the strategies that primary care physicians use to address patient COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy.

METHOD

We administered an online survey to 625 primary care physicians from May 14 to May 25, 2021, to assess the messages that primary care physicians use to encourage hesitant patients to get vaccinated against COVID-19.589 physicians from the total pool of 625 provided open-ended responses. We conducted thematic content analysis on the responses based on previous research and themes identified within the data.

SETTING

The survey was administered online using the survey research firm Dynata.

RESULTS

Eleven primary themes emerged from our analysis, which included, physicians addressing specific concerns about vaccine safety (including costs versus benefits), physicians helping patients understand what it means to remain unvaccinated, or whether physicians try to connect emotionally through the use of guilt, or personal experience, whether physicians use derisive language to communicate with unvaccinated patients. In addition, a small number of physicians indicated they would not attempt to persuade someone who is vaccine hesitant.

CONCLUSIONS

Our study shows that while some of the physicians used different strategies to address vaccine hesitancy, some of the physicians used harsh language or did not make any effort to reduce COVID-19 related vaccine hesitancy among their patients. Focused advocacy and training are needed to increase physician engagement in vaccine-related dialogues with their patients. Such efforts will ensure that critical opportunities for patient education and awareness-building are not missed and ensure high levels of vaccination uptake.