The 'Turin model' is expanding. After the success of the pilot project of the Piedmontese School of Training in General Medicine 'Massimo Ferrua' in the Turin area, the experience of vaccination in the clinic by the family doctor against Herpes zoster is expanding to the entire Piedmont region, with the offering the administration of vaccines against the 'accursed triad' to frail patients, particularly those with diabetes: Herpes zoster, pneumococcus and influenza. In percentage terms – reports a note – with this initiative medicine path, from January to August 2023, compared to the period 2018-2022, the number of doses of Herpes zoster vaccine administered more than tripled, in the different cohorts of the ages involved (from 1952 to 1958) and in subjects suffering from COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and cardiovascular diseases who fall within the shingles prevention program. The project was presented last night in Turin.
“The common objective of everyone's commitment is the global health of the citizen – explains Paolo Morato, Fimmg Vaccine Area representative (Italian Federation of General Practitioners) Piedmont – For this reason a synergy has almost naturally been created between general practitioners and institutions, which focuses on vaccination prevention as a tool to maintain psychophysical well-being, particularly in subjects at risk due to age or frailty. In this sense, protection from pneumococcal infection, influenza and the resurgence of Herpes zoster and its complications, first of all post-herpetic neuritis, represents a primary objective that we want to achieve”.
By involving the maximum number of professionals and therefore of subjects in the territory, Piedmont is creating a project of great impact, not only in terms of health – the note specifies – but also cultural. This is a real community of vaccinating doctors, with a targeted preparation process: the Piedmontese School of Training in General Medicine 'Massimo Ferrua' provides tools and materials to support colleagues who undertake the vaccination process. Not only. At the end of the extended project in the region, the results obtained will be evaluated. “Among the tasks of general medicine – underlines Alessandro Dabbene, provincial secretary of Fimmg Turin – prevention has a central role, in particular vaccinations have always been the most effective tool. In recent years we have developed a strategy to improve the management of the campaign vaccination and increase vaccination coverage of three important infectious diseases: influenza, pneumococcal pneumonia, Herpes zoster (shingles) and related complications”.
With this initiative vaccination, for the first time in Piedmont the doctors participating in the project have the opportunity to vaccinate all their patients suffering from diabetes for these three diseases. In addition to obviously continuing to propose the prevention path in the presence of cardiovascular and pulmonary pathologies and undoubtedly to patients based on age. “With this project we aim to protect increasingly larger segments of the population – concludes Stefania La Fauci, general practitioner – In this way we can also reduce visits to the emergency room, hospitalizations, consumption of antibiotics, complications and disabilities that they remain after the pathologies against which we vaccinate, creating protection for the individual and for the community”.
The main enemy for those who fear pneumonia – specifies the note – is pneumococcus, responsible for at least a third of cases. It is a bacterium of which there are different families (subtypes). Even for adults/elderly there is a vaccine that can protect against risks. Influenza can be considered a condition that can put health at risk, especially in fragile people such as those suffering from diabetes. Finally, for Herpes zoster there is clinical evidence that shows how the presence of diabetes increases the risk of both developing the infection and being faced with post-herpetic neuralgia, which is the most serious complication of the infection (Consensus Sid-Amd , vaccinations recommended in adult diabetic patients). For this reason, in addition to requiring maximum attention on the categories at risk by age or pathology, the Piedmontese initiative wants to bring people suffering from diabetes closer to the prevention path towards these pathologies.
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