This is a machine transcription and is subject to error. Apologizes in advance. 

Hey everyone, my name 's Gina and I'm an intern at the Health and Wellness Center Today I'm here with Maria Sullivan the director
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of Stonehill's Health Services. And she's here to talk a little bit about the flu vaccine. So welcome Maria
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thank you for coming. Thanks for having me Gina. To start do you mind just telling us a little bit about yourself and
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what health services does? Sure thank you so I am the Director of Health Services.
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I'm also PA or physician assistant. I actually graduated from PA school
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in December of nineteen ninety nine. I went to Emory Medical School
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Physician Assistant Program and I've been so happy to be a PA for all of these twenty years.
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Prior to coming to Stonehill I worked for thirteen years full-time
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in the ER at Brockton Hospital. So I was an emergency department PA and now I've been
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at Stonehill since March of twenty twelve and I loved every minute
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of it yeah. Great we're very lucky to have Aw, thank you. And then health services
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which is great service for students on campus. We are an appointment base
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service for all of our students. We are open Monday through Friday eight thirty to four thirty.
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We're appointment based and we really do take care of all of the acute care needs students
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to help them with their physical health to help diagnose and treat
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anything that should come up in an acute way and we do hope that students feel
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very comfortable coming to us. We wanna be available to students for any of their health care needs.
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We do know that last year the class of twenty nineteen that just graduated we have a statistic
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that show that ninety one percent of that class, twenty nineteen, came to see health services
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at some point during their college career. That's great. We know that there's high utilization. Yeah a lot of people are
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utilizing it on campus, that's awesome. Well thank you. To get a little bit about into the flu can you
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just start by explaining what the differences between the flu and a cold. Sure thank you and
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the timing is right for this Gina because the first week of December
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that happens to be national influenza vaccination week. Oh really? Yes
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I know didn't that. Yes so we hope that if you haven't already taken advantage
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of the four on campus flu clinics that we are ready held that while you're home for break
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that you considered going to get your flu vaccination while you're home
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and really at any point it would be great to get your flu vaccination. We know
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there's one thing we can count on every single year we can count on fall
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winter spring and summer. We can also count on one more season and that's flu season.
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And so every year we're going to have it we might as well be prepared for it and
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so you asked me the question cold versus flu. We know that they're both common
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respiratory illnesses. They're usually both caused by different viruses but they are very
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different strains of virus. There can be some similar symptoms but usually the flu
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is much worse and it comes on in a very acute way and very abruptly.
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So someone might be feeling well in the morning and then by the afternoon they are hit with
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very acute symptoms. Cold and flu can share many symptoms because
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they are really respiratory illnesses and so sometimes the special test has to be done to really
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figure out in the first days of illness if this is cold or flu. Symptoms of the flu
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can include fever or feeling feverish or having chills, usually cough, some sore throat
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there can be some nasal congestion, usually some body aches, headaches
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and fatigue really hit people hard. Cold symptoms are usually milder than the symptoms
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of flu and people with colds are more likely to have symptoms that do not result
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in serious health problems.Great thank you. So how does
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the flu spread like how do we actually does it go from person to person. Okay sure so flu viruses
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are thought to spread mainly by droplets made when someone with the flu coughs, sneezes,
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or talks, these droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people nearby.
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Also a person can get the flu by touching something have the flu virus on it and then touching
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their own mouths, eyes, or nose. Also if people are tending to share
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items either eating utensils or drinking bottle. Hopefully
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if people are smoking or encouraging them to quit smoking but if people are sharing smoking
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items that is another way or even lip products that's another way that
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people can spread things like makeup. That's right, it's really best to keep those things
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contained. Also if you're feeling ill and you're feeling sick it's really best to try to self
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isolate your self as much as possible. If you're within six feet radius
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of someone that's coughing or sneezing you're probably fair game to also potentially get those
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germs as well so a six foot radius around someone that's sneezing, coughing ,or showing signs
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of illnesses is probably a good rule of thumb. Yeah. Keep from. Good hand washing is huge,
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avoiding touching your own nose mouth face. Yeah that's really huge
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as well. Yeah are there any other besides like kind of avoiding people that have the
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flu or staying isolated if you have the flu is there any other way that we can prevent it.
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The best prevention, glad you brought it up, would be a flu vaccine. Yeah. The
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Centers for Disease Control is saying every single year that flu vaccination is
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the best way to prevent spreading the flu in a widespread way. We know that there are certain
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people at a higher risk for contracting the flu, people that live in close contact
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with another. Once the flu hits there's a better chance that they might be able to contract the flu.
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And so yes I highly recommend to our students here on campus that
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a flu shot is going to be the best way to prevent, again that virus that we can count
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on happening every single year. Why is it important to be vaccinated
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just in general.? Okay. That's a great question, the flu or influenza
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is a potentially serious disease and in some cases can even lead to hospitalization
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and in cases of people that don't have a strong immune system it could even lead to death.
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Every season the flu is difference and influenza infection can affect people very differently
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but if you think of it millions of people get flu every year hundreds of thousands of people
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are hospitalized because of the flu and a lot of people even die from flu
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related causes every year. And so they do say the annual seasonal flu vaccine is the best
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way to help protect against the flu. Vaccinations have been shown to have many benefits including
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reducing the risk of flu illnesses, hospitalizations, and even risks of
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flu related deaths especially in children. So of the many reasons to get a flu vaccine
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every year if I could summarize a little bit that would be great. I mean it can help
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from getting sick with the flu. And so they do say again it prevents millions of illnesses, flu
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related doctors visits every year. They were sent some statistics back in twenty seventeen/
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twenty eighteen that flu vaccination prevented an estimated seven point one million
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influenza illnesses that year. That's amazing. And again flu vaccinations reduce
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the risk of flu associated hospitalizations for children, working age adults, and older
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adults. It's an important preventative tool for people with chronic health conditions. So
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again there might be people with heart disease, or diabetes, asthma well if they get a flu shot
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it may help prevent some of the complications that a person with those illnesses may
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contract. Also really great for women during and after their pregnancy if
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a woman gets pregnant and then has the flu shot while she's pregnant it also confers some protection
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to the baby as well and especially lifesaving in children
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that can be more vulnerable. So they're really good risk factors that can
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be really mitigated by getting a flu shot and then for our students
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if you're thinking about our students and how to make it applicable to you because maybe students
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have no medical problems, maybe students have some medical problems. We know that in our community
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there's students that would be benefiting from the protection because of chronic
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medical illness that they might have but then if you even think about a healthy college
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student well if you're hit with the flu, you are public health risk for spreading the flu and so
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we're usually asking that students abide by what the CDC recommends which is
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just stay out of class and to stay out of the public until they're fever free for twenty four hours
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And so in some of our students that means four or five days out of class and so missing four or five
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days of class or a practice or a performance or a rehearsal
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for something or a work study or a job off campus. Those can be
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really important four/five days. Now you take someone that might be sick for
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longer than that. You know you're taking them out of commissions for a week or more and I know our
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students are really conscientious about missing anything. And so when you think about
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the burden of having to make up a week of work it's something to be hold. It's substantial
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amount of work to have to miss when you can just get the flu shot. Thank you, thank you! Yeah that's
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right. Yeah. Are there certain people who are at high risk flu if they should get the flu?
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Yes there are and some of the people do include some of those
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categories that we were talking about so young children, children younger than two years old are really
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vulnerable, adults sixty five years old and older, people that
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live in close contact with one another. People that there immunes are suppressed
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and anyone with a chronic health condition and the CDC has many categories
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for people that they make high recommendations to get the flu shot for. And that would be someone with asthma,
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or a blood disorder, or a chronic lung disease, or an entropy disorder like
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diabetes, heart disease, kidney disorders, liver disorders. Anyone
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that's on any special medication, anyone with a weakened immune system.
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So again there are a lot of categories for people that are considered more high risk if they should get the flu.
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But really the CDC does recommend that anyone, everyone over six months
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of age should get the flu vaccine. Is anyone shouldn't get
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the vaccine? Are there any like certain allergies or anything that can make it dangerous for that person to get the flu shot?
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That's also a really good question so children younger than six months old are too
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young to get a flu shot so they cannot get vaccinated. People that have ever had an allergic
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reaction to the flu vaccine they probably shouldn't get another one but they should definitely check in with
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their doctor about that their health care provider there may be some ingredients
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in the vaccine that people had an allergy to before. Some
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people think that if you had a severe egg allergy that's also a reason to
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not get a flu vaccine but the CDC would also say talk to your health care provider about
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that because there may be ways around that as well. So definitely if there's any
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questions people should not hesitate to speak to their primary care doctor
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about getting the flu vaccine. Also if people are feeling ill in the middle of an illness
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with a fever and not feeling well it's probably not the best day or days
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to get a flu vaccine because your immune system is already trying to fight something and it's trying to
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work to mount a response to something else so probably isn't best to
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distract it with the flu vaccine at the time. So that would just be a little bit of a week afterwards
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but not a permanent can't get a flu shot that sooner. So when
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the right time to get a flu shot? Oh that's a great question. The right time would
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be before the flu hits your community. It takes two
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weeks for the vaccination to give you the protection you need because once
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you get a flu shot your body 's gonna form some antibodies against the flu. So during
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that two week window where your body's mounting a response if you
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were to be exposed to flu virus you may still have a chance you can get a flu
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so I would say you wanna make plans early in the fall before the flu season begins.
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The CDC recommends that people get a flu vaccine by the end of October and
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so if you think about how we plan our flu vaccines and it's here on campus, I usually plan
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one for around Fresh Check Day. So usually late September and then I usually
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try to do two or three in October and then one to catch some of the stragglers
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in November but since flu has not hit our community
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in a big way at this point I would still say the time is still right.
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I's never too late to get a flu vaccine during the flu season especially if we haven't seen
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the flu cases yet. So I usually say when pumpkin spice you know flavors.
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are in the air, think about your flu shot too. So if pumpkin season seems to be right
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think about your flu shot. That's a good thing to have. So if you're
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still in flip flops maybe you have a little more time but if you're starting to think about pumpkins yeah
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you definitely would get your flu shot. So how does the vaccine actually actually work?
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Okay so the vaccine works by providing a bit of an inactivated
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virus to mount an immune response so you receive the
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vaccination, your immune system recognizes that something's in your system
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and then it forms these antibodies against it and those antibodies will
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stay circulating throughout your body really for the amount of time that we
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consider to be the flu season. Every year however we need to get new vaccinations
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because every year there's a bit of what they call anti-genetic drift of the actual flu virus
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and so last year's flu vaccine may not give you the protection for next year 's flu virus.
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Oh okay. They also think that that flu vaccine doesn't
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give you a lot of protection past a year. So that's another reason why
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it's a short term protection just to last through flu season where your antibodies will
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be circulating but then we'll need to be reacquainted in the following year and so that's why
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it's very important it's an annual flu vaccine. I do have some students saying well I got that last
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year so I don't need another one. Actually this is one of those vaccines you need an annual
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pumpkin theme. Yeah. Flu vaccination again. So are there different kinds of vaccines
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and it's one better than the other? Okay that's a great question too. So there are different
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kinds of flu vaccine, usually they protect against three or four strains
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of virus, circulating viruses. So you can hear something called a trivalent
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try meaning three so it protects against three of the viruses that's scientists have predicted
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might be in this year 's flu or quadrivalent which would be protecting against four of
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the strain. they're usually two main strains influenza a and
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influenza B and so usually the trivalent would protect against two strains of influenza a
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and one of b and the quadrivalent would be protecting against two as
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and two bs. and again some recommendations are for
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trivalent for certain age groups or people with different chronic conditions and the
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CDC says this year that they would recommend an annual flu vaccination for anyone
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six months and older with any appropriate vaccine and again
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speak to your primary care doctor but there's no preference expressed for anyone vaccine
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over another this year and in fact this year they're re- offering the nasal sprays
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for the last two years. they didn't think that the nasal spray gave great coverage and so
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they didn't recommend that particular strain of vaccine for
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the past two years but this year they say again it has good coverage they think for this
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year 's flu strain. good to know. is it true that the flu shot can actually
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give you the flu. okay so that is a myth and that's a great question I hear that a lot yeah there's
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no active live virus in the flu shot
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that is going to cause someone to get the flu. okay. and so sometimes people will say
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well that afternoon or the next day when I after I got my flu vaccine I felt like
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I was getting sick and the CDC and all the studies that
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have tried to look at this have said that there's no physical way you can get the flu from
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the vaccine. okay. and so most likely it is either an immune response
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to your body rubbing against something that is recognizing is in its system
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or it could've been coincidental that you were coming down with some sort of cold. yeah or you
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could've been exposed to the flu yeah could be getting a actual real flu but it is a myth
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they say that you can get the flu from the flu vaccine. okay. and if somebody
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is already properly vaccinated can they still get the flu? so that it can happen.
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okay and so again the effectiveness of each seasonal flu vaccine depends on several
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factors including how well the flu strains and the vaccine match the strains in circulation.
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again scientists are working round-the-clock. once flu
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season doesn't even end here they're already looking at what the strains of this virus were and
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they're already trying to plan for next year 's flu vaccine yeah because it takes that long to develop
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it and then manufacture it and so they do have to make some estimated studies
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to see what the vaccine strains are and hope there's not too much antigenic drips from
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the summer for us. yeah and then hopefully they'll be a good match. some studies
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do show that one strains in the vaccine are a good match for the ones that are circulating vaccinated
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individuals are sixty percent less likely to catch the flu and people who aren't vaccinated.
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so yes there's still a chance you can get the flu. even if you've had the flu vaccine.
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effectiveness of the vaccine also can vary depending on the person being vaccinated in other words
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does it tend to work best in healthy adults and older children. yeah. does it work as well
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in older adults with chronic medical conditions probably not as well they do
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say many studies have been done. they suggest that individuals who do get sick
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even if they've gotten the flu shot. developed less severe symptoms because they've gotten some partial
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protection if they're vaccinated. they do find the people who got the flu shot were less
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sick then if they hadn't been less likely to be hospitalized with the flu so
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okay. we still do see some good protection there. yeah it's still beneficial even if you can still get the flu
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that's right. good to know. alright my question for you we are on a college campus we have a lot of students that do some
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traveling whether it's studying abroad or a service trip. so if somebody's traveling abroad or they're
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going on a service trip with a population that might be vulnerable, should they get the flu shot? I would I would
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highly recommend that they do that and I feel like that's a true problem to answer to
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you know one issue is to protect yourself as the traveler right so. you'll be traveling
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maybe in close contact with a lot of other people. yeah maybe one in that group
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was starting to get sick but didn't realize it even they were starting out with the trip or with the travel.
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you might be on many types of different public transportation you might be on planes trains or automobile
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vans buses where there could be people that could have flu symptoms that
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you know when again you're in close contact with people and so things get to spread pretty easily
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when you don't have that six foot. yeah. radius that gives you a little bit of protection
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from coughing sneezing people with germs. also from I would say from a social justice
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issue. when you think about it you might be traveling especially if you're doing a service or a hope trip
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to an area that maybe has less availability of flu vaccine less
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access to health care maybe living with people that are considered more
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vulnerable population and they don't have the privilege of getting a flu vaccine
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and so for a traveler to go into community and maybe potentially bring
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an infection with them also seems like something to think about and if there's a way
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to reduce that potential and to maybe get some protections from a flu
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shot. it is a step in the right direction. again if you are traveler
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and you're planning to go study abroad or doing an internship or go on a hope trip
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really paramount that you know. again the holiday break the winter break before you leave two
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weeks before you leave you wanna make sure you had that shot so that you have that chance to have that protection
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conferred and again we're thinking about things from the northern hemisphere and so
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our flu season comes first. but as you go towards
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April to September that would be kind of flu season for the southern hemisphere . yeah I
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didn't even think about yeah. so it does drift and that's yeah that's also interesting and something
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to think about so depending on when you're traveling you know may not be too late
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to get your your flu shot. so I think it's really important to think about that
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to offer that protection both to yourself to your fellow travelers and to the group that you might
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be serving working with. well thank you so much again for joining us today.
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and if anyone listening wants any more information feel free to visit either the health and wellness page or
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the health services page on the Stonehill website. thank you thank so much for having me today here. yes of course and
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don't forget to get vaccinated. yeah. thank you. you're welcome. alright
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This is a machine transcription and is subject to error. Apologizes in advance.