Why flu vaccines are more important than ever in this pandemic [PODCAST]

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“The flu vaccine can strengthen your immune system, prevent the disease spread among those closest to you, protect your children, and reduce the health care system’s burden. Protecting ourselves and others as we traverse a pandemic is paramount in saving lives and keeping our communities safe and healthy. Along with our ongoing initiatives through Covid Rapid Response Team Chicago to maintain an adequate supply of PPE, host blood drives, and perform screenings in homeless shelters, increasing the rate of flu vaccinations is essential to protect the community. Our country has suffered more than enough during this COVID-19 pandemic – do your part and protect yourself, your loved ones, and our health care heroes this fall by getting your flu shot.”

Marina Lentskevich is a medical student.

She shares her story and discusses the KevinMD article that she co-wrote, “Why flu vaccines are more important than ever in this pandemic.”

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Hosted by Kevin Pho, MD, The Podcast by KevinMD shares the stories of the many who intersect with our health care system but are rarely heard from.

Transcript

Kevin Pho: Hi, and welcome to the show, where you share the stories of the many who intersect with our health care system but are rarely heard from. My name is Kevin Pho, founder and editor of KevinMD. Today on the show, we have Marina Lentskevich. She is a medical student, and she co-wrote the KevinMD article “Why flu vaccines are more important than ever in this pandemic.” Marina, welcome to the show.

Marina Lentskevich: Thank you for having me, Dr. Pho. Appreciate it.

Kevin Pho: So we’ll get into the article in a little bit, but first off, can you share a story and your journey to where you are today?

Marina Lentskevich: I believe this year was a very transformative year for a lot of us, and I’m not an exception to that rule. In spring of this year, when the U.S. closed down from the pandemic and Chicago especially got hit very hard, I volunteered with COVID Rapid Response Team Chicago, which is an organization that I helped found with a bunch of medical students from all over the Chicago area. I am a second-year medical student at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and I had the privilege to work with medical students from all the other schools as well.

Basically, what we did was provide volunteers at sites that were lacking people, since we as a health care system were underprepared for the pandemic. A lot of the burden was very sudden, and I personally saw hospitals very much struggling, especially in the spring, especially the ones that are less funded. So as part of the Rapid Response Team, we provided COVID testing and COVID symptom screening in various locations, including homeless shelters, which turned out to be little epicenters of the disease as well, and helped with funding for the PPE for the hospitals, et cetera.

Kevin Pho: So as a second-year medical student, what are some things that you’ve learned over the course of the pandemic?

Marina Lentskevich: Ironically, we were in our pulmonary block when COVID hit, and we were lucky to have amazing pulmonologists talk to us about the progression of the disease as they were learning about it, and we were lucky to get firsthand information as soon as it came out.

Also, something that I knew, that I kind of explained to friends who are not in medical school, is that medicine is constantly evolving. Many ask me why the CDC and doctors begin with certain recommendations in, say, March and then change those recommendations later, right? A lot of people didn’t understand that. What I learned this year is that medicine evolves, and in 2020, it evolves at a speed that has never been seen before. The amount of knowledge doubles within a week at this point, and I think that’s fantastic.

Kevin Pho: All right, so let’s transition into the KevinMD article that you co-wrote, “Why flu vaccines are more important than ever in this pandemic.” Now, for those who haven’t read the article, can you walk my audience through it and share the story of why you decided to co-write it?

Marina Lentskevich: The article is about flu vaccines in COVID times, and basically it’s trying to convince the reader to get a flu shot. There are various reasons for it, and the most important one, I think, is trying to decrease the burden on the health care system. As I already told you, this spring, the burden was so big and so sudden, the health care system really struggled, and some underfunded hospitals actually closed down because the elective surgeries were canceled and they couldn’t make enough money. That really influenced my interest in the flu season during the pandemic.

The article talks about decreasing the amount of burden, and also about the danger of a co-infection of flu and COVID together, and potentially some bad complications from that, of course. And then we talked about that, thankfully, the CDC provided a very large number of flu vaccines this year, a lot more than the years before, especially considering that a lot of people lost their health insurance this year due to loss of employment. Thankfully, flu shots have been provided for free for uninsured folks all over the country at a lot higher rate than usual.

Kevin Pho: Now, in my primary care clinic, I still have a substantial portion of patients who refuse to get a flu shot. From your experience, with your co-authors and in your institution, and from your research, what do you think are some of the reasons why people are still hesitant to receive flu shots, especially during the pandemic?

Marina Lentskevich: That’s a great question. I think the main answer is misinformation, or lack of information. I noticed that people who believe that COVID is just a flu really overlap with the people who believe they don’t need a flu shot because, quote, they don’t get flu anyway. Unfortunately, this kind of population also tends to ignore CDC regulations on mask wearing, social distancing, and avoiding travel during these times. So I think this population is especially vulnerable to co-infections and really bad complications, long-term complications that we are not even aware of yet, from COVID.

The way I approached trying to address the misinformation is by trying to question these people’s beliefs, not in an aggressive way. I would just ask, “What happens if you get the shot? Do you think it’s going to hurt you? If not, then why are you so against it?” I think that when you start asking these people to critically analyze their beliefs, some of them change their mind.

Kevin Pho: Now, we’re seeing that the flu, especially in the Southern Hemisphere, has been much less than normal, partially because everyone’s probably masked up, and so far, we’re seeing encouraging numbers regarding the flu. Just from your research, do you expect a weaker-than-normal flu season this year, just because everyone is masked up and wearing PPE?

Marina Lentskevich: I think it’s very great that the flu season is not as bad as usual, and I do think it’s definitely because of the mask wearing, and it definitely shows that masks work, that social distancing works. Unfortunately, I heard that some people think that the flu season is weaker because it’s being underreported. I hear some people saying that the flu is as high as usual; it’s just being reported as COVID. And despite me bringing up the point that people are getting COVID-tested, that flu and COVID, despite being viral diseases, are different diseases, different viruses, and different viral families, I can see that people who are very far from the medical field are still struggling to understand the reasoning here.

Kevin Pho: Now, from your research, what do you think are the most powerful arguments that you could share with primary care clinicians like myself, and those listening to the podcast, to convince people in the exam room to take the flu shots? What do you think are the arguments that would resonate the most with these patients?

Marina Lentskevich: I think you really have to take a personal approach at this point. Our article mentioned several different approaches, and I noticed that different approaches work with different people. One approach that you can take with parents is that if your child ends up in a hospital with flu, because children do tend to be hospitalized with flu sometimes, having a child in the hospital during the COVID pandemic could be extremely stressful, and you won’t be able to visit the child as often. You won’t be able to be there for the child. That’s one approach that you could take.

Another approach is to try to explain that the burden on the health care system currently is incredibly overwhelming, and the number of ICU beds available is going down, going down again. Actually, in Illinois, we transitioned back from phase four to phase three because hospitals are getting a lot busier currently. Some people like facts; some people like numbers. So when shown that hospitals have been incredibly busy, and that you should do your best to try to avoid hospitalization, not even for yourself but also for people who surround you, your family or maybe your co-worker with a weaker immune system, these people tend to listen and tend to take the flu shot.

Some people simply do not know how available flu vaccines are. They are not aware that you can get a flu shot basically at any grocery store, any large grocery store at this point, and any pharmacy, and the majority of the flu shots available are for free. A lot of people don’t know that because they never really did research and never looked into that, so they think it’s another complicated process that they have to go to, and it’s not.

Kevin Pho: We’re talking to Marina Lentskevich. She is a medical student, and she co-wrote the KevinMD article “Why flu vaccines are more important than ever in this pandemic.” Marina, you’re a second-year medical student, and we’re talking in the middle of December. What are some pieces of advice that you could share with other medical students who are also going through their medical education journey during this pandemic?

Marina Lentskevich: I think this year really showed that not one system is perfect. There’s always space for improvement, and I learned that you should never be afraid to ask; you should never be afraid to try. Sometimes it seems like a system is so monolithic, so untouchable, so unchangeable, that you just kind of try to roll with it. But being medical students, being highly educated individuals, we really should be the ones trying to innovate these systems and to improve our patients’ health. I personally think that advocating for patients’ health is a very important part of medicine.

Kevin Pho: And my final question: What’s your take-home message that you want to leave with the KevinMD audience?

Marina Lentskevich: Critically analyzing your actions and your beliefs is what makes you a better person, and you should never be afraid to unlearn, relearn, and learn something new.

Kevin Pho: Thank you so much for sharing your time and insight, and thanks again for being on the show.

Marina Lentskevich: Thank you.

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