Provider Perceptions and Use of Audit-Feedback and Communication Strategies to Improve Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Uptake

Objective: Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine uptake remains suboptimal among US adolescents. A cluster randomized trial was conducted at six primary care practices in southeast Minnesota to assess the impact of parent reminder-recall letters and provider audit-feedback reports on 11-12-year-old HPV vaccine uptake. Audit-feedback reports included access to a web toolkit with instruction on two communication approaches. We evaluated the process of the audit-feedback report intervention to inform future adaptations.

Methods: We sent a survey to providers assigned to the intervention and asked about their use and perceptions of the reports, web toolkit, the communication approaches, and HPV vaccine recommendation.

Results: Surveys from 95 providers were analyzed. Most (97.9%) recalled receiving audit-feedback reports, with 92.4% finding them somewhat to very easy to understand, 86% somewhat to very familiar with their content and objectives, and 69.9% using them five or more times in the past year. Few respondents (11.6%) recalled receiving access to the web toolkit. Web analytics showed that the toolkit was rarely used. Most reported familiarity with communication approaches but less than half reported that these positively impacted the tone of the clinical encounter. Higher familiarity with audit-feedback reports (OR=2.58) and perceived peer approval about using presumptive language (the first of two communication approaches) to recommend HPV vaccination (OR=2.16) correlated with higher frequency of vaccine recommendation.

Conclusions: Implementation of the audit-feedback reports showed good acceptability. Low utilization of the web toolkit suggests a need to further examine provider preferences on delivery and usability of training materials.