Last Updated: 2002-11-11 14:03:33 -0400 (Reuters Health)

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The vast majority of hospitalized older adult patients are not being vaccinated for either the flu or pneumococcal disease, new study findings show.

Because sick people confined to a hospital are more vulnerable to infection, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommends influenza and pneumococcal vaccines to all adult hospital patients "as a strategy for increasing vaccination coverage among adults," according to the report published in the November 11th issue of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.

But after reviewing the medical records of 107,311 Medicare patients 65 and older, lead author Dr. Dale W. Bratzler of the Oklahoma Foundation for Medical Quality in Oklahoma City and colleagues found that, of the adults who were unvaccinated prior to their hospital stay, over 97% were not vaccinated against influenza while in the hospital, and just over 99% did not receive pneumococcal vaccination.

This underuse of these vaccines "is not without consequences," the authors write.

Influenza accounts for more than 100,000 hospitalizations and 20,000 deaths each year, and Streptococcus pneumoniae causes at least 500,000 cases of pneumonia each year in the US, along with other types of infection. When combined, influenza and pneumococcal infections represent the fifth leading cause of death for people over age 65, the report indicates.

"Failure to vaccinate these inpatients is a missed opportunity that places them at risk for preventable adverse events including morbidity, hospital readmission and death associated with influenza and pneumococcal disease," Bratzler and colleagues write.

"Ensuring that hospital inpatients are screened for immunization status and vaccinated when appropriate will require the implementation of strategies such as those being used to prevent other forms of medical errors--systems-based approaches that provide for the routine delivery of these vaccines to patients at high risk for subsequent disease," the authors conclude.