ArticleEpidemiologia (Basel, Switzerland)2025
Navigating Vaccine Misinformation: Assessing Newly Licensed Physicians' Ability to Distinguish Facts from Fake News.
Article in Epidemiologia (Basel, Switzerland), 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
What it found
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Determinants of vaccine hesitancy among primary healthcare workers in Türkiye.Human vaccines & immunotherapeutics · 2026Article
- The impact of pediatric influenza and COVID-19 hospitalization on parental attitudes toward vaccination.Human vaccines & immunotherapeutics · 2026Observational
- Medical misinformation and the crisis of professional authority.Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine · 2026Article
- Article
- Supporting Primary Care Communication on Vaccination in Multilingual and Culturally Diverse Settings: Lessons from South Tyrol, Italy.Epidemiologia (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundNewly licensed physicians play a significant role in healthcare systems. However, they often lack knowledge about vaccine practices. This study aims to evaluate their ability to distinguish between fake news and the actual side effects of vaccines.
methodsWe distributed a questionnaire to assess newly licensed physicians' knowledge of side effects of vaccines and widespread fake news about them. We enrolled 317 newly licensed Italian physicians.
resultsThe average questionnaire score was 6.21/10 (SD = ±1.25). Work experience and age did not correlate with scores.
conclusionsMany participants were not able to distinguish between fake news and real vaccines' side effects (e.g., the possible association between varicella vaccine and seizures). Furthermore, many physicians have been shown to believe in fake news. This lack of knowledge could lead to the inability to scientifically respond to anti-vaccinationists, thus increasing mistrust in medical counseling. Addressing knowledge gaps among recently licensed physicians is crucial to improving proper counseling and increasing public adherence to vaccination campaigns.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.