Evidence-Based Storytelling for a Strategic Roadmap to Promote Cancer Prevention via Adolescent HPV Vaccination in Northern New England

Crit Rev Eukaryot Gene Expr. 2024;34(4):69-102. doi: 10.1615/CritRevEukaryotGeneExpr.2024052382.

Abstract

Vaccination rates for the human papillomavirus (HPV) among rural youth in northern New England lag those of more urbanized areas. Reasons include a lack of available medical offices, time constraints, perceptions of vaccines and HPV, and, to a smaller degree, delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. We have a responsibility to increase vaccinations in these communities. To do so, vaccination experts recommend addressing the three C's of vaccination hesitation: confidence, complacency, and convenience. With this framework as our foundation, in this article we detail a plan to address these important elements, and we add several more C's: clinics, communication, collaboration, community, capacity, and commitment to the list as we discuss the essential pieces-human, infrastructural, and perceptual-needed to create and promote successful, community-supported, school-based HPV vaccination clinics to serve youths aged nine to 18. We then integrate research and storytelling science into an innovative Persuasion Playbook, a guide for local opinion leaders to use in creating evidence-based, pro-vaccine messages on the community level to promote the clinics via evidence-based, pro-vaccination messages.

MeSH terms

  • Adolescent
  • Communication
  • Humans
  • Neoplasms*
  • New England
  • Pandemics
  • Papillomavirus Infections* / epidemiology
  • Papillomavirus Vaccines*
  • Vaccination

Substances

  • Papillomavirus Vaccines