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September 12, 2025Vaccines4 citationsOpen Access

Strategies to Increase Vaccinations in Adult Cancer Patients: A Systematic Review

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GMGiuseppina Lo MoroFGFederica GolzioSCSara Calabrese

Key Points

  • Vaccination uptake was significantly improved in 66.7% of studies reviewed, indicating potential effectiveness of implemented strategies.
  • Out of 10,927 records, 15 studies focused on various interventions aimed at increasing vaccinations among cancer patients.
  • Most successful strategies involved education, reminders, and counseling, showing promise for improving vaccination coverage in oncology.
  • The review highlights methodological limitations that call for more rigorous research to enhance the generalizability of findings.

Abstract

Background/Objectives: Although vaccinations are a priority for patients with cancer, achieving high coverage remains challenging. Evidence on effective strategies in oncology settings is still limited. This systematic review aimed to identify interventions to improve vaccination uptake or reduce hesitancy among cancer patients. Methods: A systematic search was conducted in PubMed, Embase, and Scopus, including studies published up to the end of 2023. The protocol was registered in PROSPERO (CRD42024511008). Results: Out of 10,927 non-duplicate records, 15 studies describing unique interventions were included. All studies were published between 2011 and 2022, primarily conducted in Europe/UK (40%) and in North America (40%). The most common study design was pre-post (60%), and 33.3% included a control group. Most interventions were multi-component (60%) and were classified into three main categories: educational materials/campaigns (46.7%), reminders (40%), and patient counselling (33.3%). Additional components included guideline development in two studies. Some studies also highlighted the importance of specific key figures, such as dedicated professionals, general practitioners, and pharmacists. Interventions mainly targeted patients (40%), with 33.3% addressing both healthcare professionals and patients and 26.7% professionals only. They most frequently concerned vaccinations against influenza and pneumococcal disease (26.7%), pneumococcal disease alone (26.7%), or Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) (26.7%). Vaccination uptake was the primary outcome in 86.7% of studies, with 66.7% reporting significant improvements. Conclusions: This review identified a variety of strategies, with education, reminders, and counselling as key components. Multicomponent interventions and those involving both patients and providers were most promising. However, methodological limitations and limited generalizability highlighted the need for more rigorous research.

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Cite This Study

Moro et al. (2025) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/68d44a3731b076d99fa53763https://doi.org/10.3390/vaccines13090964
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