Target Audience

Southern Medical Journal (SMJ) is an interdisciplinary, multi-specialty Journal, and articles span the spectrum of medical topics, providing timely, up-to-date information for primary care physicians and specialists alike. The SMJ enables physicians to provide the best possible care to patients in this age of rapidly changing modern medicine.  Therefore, the readers of the SMJ are an appropriate target for this article. 

Description

Despite recommendations for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination during pregnancy, some pregnant women are concerned about COVID-19 vaccines and decline to be vaccinated. This study focuses on attitudes in a sample of mostly minority pregnant Hispanic and Black women that may influence vaccine hesitancy. It was determined that attitudes for knowing about the health topics were in the range from agree to strongly agree, whereas attitudes for knowing about topics pertaining to COVID-19 messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines were in a lower-level range from neutral to agree. Negative vaccine attitudes were significantly associated with decreased agreement for knowing about health attitudes, but not significantly associated with COVID-19 mRNA vaccine attitudes. COVID-19 vaccine mRNA technology was a lesser understood topic than attitudes for knowing about other health topics. This finding suggests the need for physician intervention and that further education about COVID-19 vaccine mRNA technology may influence patient attitudes toward acceptance of the COVID-19 mRNA vaccine in pregnancy.

At the conclusion of the activity, learners should be better prepared to:

• Recognize that attitudes regarding COVID-19 vaccinations of pregnant Hispanic and Black women may influence their decisions to accept or refuse COVID-19 vaccination during pregnancy.
• Implement modifications of physician-patient interactions to improve the attitudes and knowledge of pregnant women and to thereby reduce rates of non-acceptance of COVID-19 vaccinations during pregnancy and thereby reduce unfavorable pregnancy outcomes due to vaccine-preventable COVID-19 complications.

Course Information

CME Release Date: August 4, 2023
Valid for credit through:  August 3, 2026  
Course type: Journal CME/CE
Estimated time of completion: 1 hour

Credits Available

Southern Medical Association is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

Southern Medical Association designates this Journal CME/CE activity for a maximum of 1 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

AAPA: AAPA accepts certificates of participation for educational activities certified for AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™ from organizations accredited by ACCME or a recognized state medical society. 

AANPCP: The American Academy of Nurse Practitioners Certification Program (AANPCP) accepts AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™ from organizations accredited by the ACCME.

Healthcare Professionals: For information on applicability and acceptance of continuing education credit for this activity, please consult your professional licensing board.  All healthcare professionals who are not MDs or DOs will receive a certificate of participation.

Instructions for Participation and Credit

This activity is designed to be completed within the time designated; learners should claim only those credits that reflect the time actually spent in the activity. To successfully earn credit, participants must complete the activity online during the valid credit period noted, following these steps:

• Read the goals and objectives, accreditation information, and author disclosures.
• Login in below to study the educational content and references.
• Complete the attestation, post-test (if applicable), and evaluation.

Upon successful completion of these components, your certificate will be processed and emailed from customerservice@sma.org within approximately 1 hour. Credits will be archived for 6 years; at any point within this time period you may login to your account to print a duplicate copy of your certificate.

Disclosure of Relevant Financial Relationships

Southern Medical Association (SMA) requires instructors, planners, managers, and all other individuals who are in a position to control the content of this activity to disclose conflicts of interest (COI) with ineligible entities within the last 24 months of the development of this activity. All identified COIs are thoroughly vetted and mitigated prior to the release of the activity. SMA is committed to providing its learners with high quality activities and related materials that promote improvements or quality in healthcare and not a specific proprietary business interest of a commercial interest.

The following individuals, unless otherwise noted, have no relevant financial relationships to disclose.

Manuscript Author(s):
Engelbert Bonilla, MD
Joshua Fogel, PhD
Robert Hubley, BS
Rahul Anand, BS
Paul C. Liu, MD, JD

Southern Medical Association/Southern Medical Journal Editorial Staff:
Steven T. Baldwin, MD, SMJ Editor-in-Chief
Jennifer S. Price, MA, Managing Editor
Anita McCabe, Copyeditor