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Learn more about the FluMist

With flu season approaching, it’s time to start thinking about getting your flu vaccine.  If you are squeamish when it comes to shots, consider another option - the flu mist.  The U.S Food and Drug Administration recently approved the use of FluMist ® for children two to five years of age.  Previously the age group was limited to healthy people between five and 49 years of age.

The FluMist offers a few benefits over the flu shot, one of which is the effectiveness of the vaccine.  A study completed in the 2004-2005 flu season, involving more than 4,000 children between two and five years of age, showed that flu cases were reduced by 54 percent when the FluMist was used instead of the traditional flu shot.  Young children have very high attack rates for influenza and often require medical evaluation when they get it.  Children who attend school are also at high risk for the flu, since children in this age group spend most of their day in close contact with other kids.  Children ages two to 17 are twice as likely to get the flu than an adult, even elderly adults.

The FluMist has demonstrated protection against both matched and mismatched strains.  As influenza circulates through different people and populations, it changes.  New and unpredictable strains of the flu can emerge.  Since the flu vaccines are chosen well in advance of the flu season, it is difficult to match every strain of the flu with the appropriate vaccine.  The FluMist can help protect against the matched strains as well as some that aren’t expected.

The FluMist works by stimulating an immune response that closely mirrors how our bodies would naturally react to an infection.  The mist contains attenuate live vaccine strains, but they are engineered so they don’t cause disease.  Instead, they help protect you from it.

There are some individuals who should not use the FluMist.  Adults 50 years and older and children ages six months to two years should not use the mist.  In fact, children under six months should not receive either form of the flu vaccine.  People who have long-term health problems, such as heart, lung or kidney disease, diabetes, asthma, anemia or other blood disorder, should not get the mist.  Pregnant women, children or adolescents using long-term aspirin treatment and anyone with a history of Guillain-Barre syndrom should not utilize the FluMist.  People who fall into any of the above categories should still get vaccinated, but it would be best to get the inactivated influenza vaccine, which is in the shot form.

Kossuth Regional Health Center is offering several opportunities for people to get their flu vaccine, whether it is the shot or the mist.  On Saturday, October 20, KRHC will host its largest flu vaccine clinic of the fall at the Algona High School Commons from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.  Cost for the vaccine is $25.

For more information on flu vaccines and upcoming flu clinics, contact the KRHC Flu Information Line at 515.295.4451 or 1.800.603.8433, ext. 698, or go to the KRHC website at www.krhc.com.

-Mary Hilbert is an R.N. with Kossuth Regional Health Center Community Health