Assuring that pregnant women have all required influenza vaccinations is a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) priority because pregnant women infected with influenza are at increased risk for severe disease and adverse reproductive outcomes, including birth defects and fetal loss.

CDC also seeks to promote routine influenza vaccination of health care personnel (HCP) every influenza season. This reduces morbidity and mortality from influenza and its potentially serious consequences not only among HCP, but also among their patients. Timely survey data are essential during an influenza epidemic to inform prevention and response efforts. These data also allow ongoing monitoring of seasonal trends in vaccination.

Abt Associates, under a contract with CDC, developed and implemented two separate web surveys of pregnant women and HCP recruited from a large pre-existing opt-in internet panels. The surveys were conducted twice – at the midpoint and near the end – during each of the 2011-12, 2012-13, 2013-14 and 2014-15 influenza seasons. The primary objectives of these surveys are to

• Obtain information about influenza vaccine coverage and knowledge, attitudes, behaviors, and barriers among these two high-priority populations and;
• Provide these data to CDC as quickly as possible to support the development and modification of public health communication and partnership efforts before the beginning of the ensuing influenza season.

For each survey, Abt attained survey completion rates of more than 90 percent among both pregnant women and HCP. Abt successfully completed data collection, weighting, and descriptive analysis for each influenza season’s two surveys within four weeks.