It is AHA policy that all health care workers must either receive a yearly flu vaccination or wear a mask during Flu season in order to maintain an environment that promotes health. It is important to remember that nurses, doctors, technicians, and even the hospital cleaning staff only have their jobs because of the patients that come in. The basic underlying goal of every hospital is to improve health outcomes for the patients. The Flu is one of many diseases that can spread quickly throughout a hospital. A hospital has a high concentration of people that are young, old, and immunocompromised; the three target groups that the Flu can do the most damage in.

So, why is a flu shot or wearing masks a necessity for nurses? The Flu has an incubation period of about 1-3 days. Essentially, this means that the Flu can infect a host, stay latent but infectious within the host, and all without causing symptoms for 3 days. The Flu can either be spread by aerosolization or by large droplet. Without a mask or the Flu shot, nurses are perfect the vectors to unknowingly transmit the virus to all of the patients.

Did You Get The Flu Shot?

Pros:

The Flu shot is a great option to prevent the spread of Flu in a hospital or clinic. The vaccination is completely safe, and will not cause anything but maybe a bruise on your arm. The myth that the Flu shot gives you a cold is completely false; the vaccination contains attenuated virus, which isn’t capable of functioning or replicating as it normally would, and cannot cause any disease.

The Flu shot is very convenient for nurses. It is a one-time pain, and most of the time, it is either free at a vaccination event or is covered by insurance. With just five minutes and the small prick of a needle, your responsibility of beneficence to the patient is fulfilled for the Flu season. There is no maintenance needed, and no obstruction at work like with wearing a mask.

Cons:

The Flu vaccine is trivalent, meaning that it vaccinates against 3 specific types of Flu. The CDC and other health organizations work hard with epidemiologists in the Eastern Hemisphere to predict what the most likely strains are to reach the United States. In the 2016-2017 season, the shot vaccinated against A/California/7/2009 (H1N1)pdm09-like virus, A/Hong Kong/4801/2014 (H3N2)-like virus, and B/Brisbane/60/2008-like virus (B/Victoria lineage). If you as a nurse become infected with a different strain of the Flu, the shot does not protect you or the patients, and once again you are the perfect viral reservoir to shed the virus for days before showing symptoms, and to expose all of your patients.

There are a variety of other reasons that people do not receive a Flu shot. One of the most common reasons not to get a shot is due to a personal religious belief. For example, members of Jehovah’s Witness, The Christian Scientists, and the Dutch Reformed Church all believe that vaccinations interfere with a proper spiritual relationship with God. Another common reason that people don’t get a Flu shot is due to an extreme dislike or fear of needles. Though it’s a nearly painless process, there are lots of people who psych themselves out mentally, and will avoid needles at all costs.

Are You Wearing a Mask?

Pros:

If you belong to one of the previously discussed groups of people who would like to avoid needles or vaccination in general, the mask provides an alternative. Until recently, there wasn’t an alternative at all to the Flu shot. Hospitals were making them mandatory for health care workers with no alternative, and firing all non-compliant workers.

Masks are advantageous when compared with Flu shots because they protect you and your patients from all strains of the Flu rather than just the three predicted strains. This means that if the CDC makes poor predictions or if there is randomly a Flu strain that spreads locally, your safety practices will keep the patients as safe and healthy as possible.

Cons:

Unlike with the Flu shot, health care workers who wear masks to work must continue to maintain that responsibility all throughout Flu season. Rather than getting a shot for five minutes and forgetting about it until next year, people who wear masks must wear them with every patient during Flu season.

Many nurses who choose to wear masks to work complain of sweating and excessive heat. They complain that patients often cannot hear them correctly because of how reliant humans are on reading lips and integrating that information with what we’ve heard. Some have described wearing a mask for 12 hours in a day as a claustrophobic experience.