Fewer than 30 percent of Dayton (Ohio) Children's Hospital patients had a flu shot in 2017, prompting the hospital to provide them for children age 7 and up at its pharmacies, according to the Dayton Daily News.
The vaccination rate is a "disturbingly low percentage," said Sherman Alter, MD, chief of the hospital's division of infectious disease.
The hospital's vaccination program will resemble a retail pharmacy's vaccine service. The hospital will bill a family's insurance company and send documentation to the primary care physician to include in the patient's records.
The vaccination program grew from a pilot study that found fewer than 30 percent of children who came to Dayton Children's were vaccinated against the flu in 2017.
Patients' families will be informed about the vaccine offering when they register for an outpatient visit, an inpatient stay or in the emergency room.