UIW Med School Delivers Preventive Care to Community
In August, UIWSOM students and faculty provided 544 vaccinations to 255 children during four back-to-school vaccination clinics on San Antonio’s South and West sides.
Safe and effective vaccines against human papilloma virus (HPV) that prevent cervical, anogenital, and head and neck cancers in women and men have been available and recommended for more than a decade. Yet acceptance nationwide is low: only 63% of teen girls and 50% of teen boys have started the vaccination series.
Community outreach in San Antonio is having much better results.
The vaccines provided by UIWSOM were available to patients of all ages, but especially targeted were 11-12 year olds for meningococcal (required for college entrance in Texas), tetanus-diphtheria-acellular pertussis (tetanus booster plus the newly recommended pertussis booster for whooping cough), and HPV vaccines.