Prevalence and predictors of influenza and pneumococcal vaccine uptake in patients with diabetes.

The Irish Immunisation Guidelines recommend that people with diabetes mellitus receive the seasonal influenza and pneumococcal vaccines. We aimed to gather data on seasonal influenza vaccine uptake over the previous twelve months, to determine pneumococcal vaccine uptake over a lifetime, and to identify predictors that may influence likelihood of vaccine uptake. A combination of retrospective medical record review and patient questionnaire was undertaken over a three-month period in a diabetes outpatient clinic. Two hundred patients, 28.5% (n=57) with type 1 and 70.5% (n=141) with type 2 diabetes were questioned. Uptake of seasonal influenza vaccine in the previous year was 64.5%. Reported lifetime uptake rate of pneumococcal vaccine was 22%. Increasing age, increasing duration of diabetes and history of recent GP visits significantly increased frequency of influenza vaccination over a five-year period. Significant predictors of influenza vaccination over the previous 12 months included those receiving GP recommendation [OR 10.6 (95% CI 4.3-26.4)] and those aged over 65 [OR 2.8 (1.008-7.8)]. Significant predictors of pneumococcal vaccine uptake included GP recommendation [OR=63 (10-388)] and chronic kidney disease [OR=22 (1.5-312)]. Increased uptake of vaccines is desirable and may be improved by general practices targeting subsets of the population and annual auditing.