Beehive Comprehensive Clinic Inc

Happy National Nurse Practitioner Week to our four fantastic NPs and our 385,000 other NP colleagues in the nation providing high quality, patient centered, holistic care! We are deeply grateful for our patients who entrust us with their health.

All four of our clinicians are educated at the doctoral level, trained at the University of Utah Family Nurse Practitioner Program (ranked #25 out of 426 programs nationally). Read more about us here:

Providers - Beehive Comprehensive Clinic I am board certified as a family nurse practitioner by the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, educated with a Doctorate of Nursing Practice degree

We are so excited to announce that Christina Maruyama, DNP, APRN, FNP-C is booking appointments with availability as soon as this week! She is a great addition to our team. Call 801-252-6116 to schedule an appointment.

One of the features that makes Beehive stand out from other clinics is that we take our time to get to know you so that we can treat you as a whole person. The first visit is 60 minutes, wellness/physical visits are 45 minutes, and standard follow up visits are 30 minutes. We recognize that body systems and disease processes are interrelated and should be addressed together. We take a wide variety of insurance plans and also have affordable cash prices for those without insurance. See details at beehiveclinic.com.

Beehive Comprehensive Clinic just celebrated three years of taking excellent care of our community this week. We are delighted to announce that Christina Maruyama, DNP, APRN, FNP-C will be joining our team later this month!

Her bio:

I am a board-certified family nurse practitioner through the American Association of Nurse Practitioners. I earned my Doctorate of Nursing Practice and Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of Utah. I also hold a Bachelor of Arts in Biology from Colorado College. My clinical background is in acute care and palliative care. I particularly enjoy working with patients in the LGBTQ+ community, those with mental health concerns, and those looking to improve their overall health and wellness. I am eager to get to know each patient as a whole person and to develop care plans that are tailored to their individual needs.

When I am not seeing patients, I enjoy hiking and skiing in the Wasatch Range and playing ultimate frisbee. I love sharing home-made meals with friends and spending time with my family and shiba inu, Charlie.

Please call 801-252-6116 to be added to her schedule!

Beehive Comprehensive Clinic is actively looking for a full time or two part time medical assistants. Our amazing MAs that we hired from interning with us through the high school program are going off to college and we are expanding this fall to add a fourth provider. We will happily take a phlebotomist, CNA, EMT, or MA and fill in any training gaps. We have a great clinic environment with paid holidays for all employees, no weekends or nights, and the MAs work a consistent schedule. We flex around school schedules as much as possible because it's important to us to support people who are furthering their education.
Please follow this link for more information and feel free to share the post:

Medical Assistant Job Posting Our busy family practice is seeking a part- or full-time Medical Assistant who is highly motivated, friendly, outgoing and professional, loves to learn, works well under pressure, and provides courteous and friendly patient care. Job Responsibilities Provide excellent patient care, responding...

We are looking for a couple of new team members to join us, specifically a receptionist for Tuesdays and Thursdays, and a part or full time MA. We welcome applicants who have CNA, EMT, MA, or phlebotomy training. Please follow the links below for more information on how to apply.

Bit.ly/BeehiveMA
Bit.ly/BeehiveReception

Q: Do I *really* need a COVID-19 booster? Does it matter?

A: Yes. The boosters are an essential part of the COVID-19 vaccine series. They are not optional or extra.

When the COVID-19 vaccine trails began, the main goal was to make a safe, effective vaccine that could be tested as fast as possible. The two doses in the primary series (for Pfizer, Moderna, Novavax, AstraZeneca, and others) were spaced quite close together, as vaccines go. This was not because 3 or 4 weeks was thought to be the *best possible* spacing. No: it was because we needed to get vaccine trials done as fast as possible because people were dying. The goals were safe, fast, and effective. Fast was a priority.

In the fullness of time, we learned that our immune systems benefit quite a bit from a reminder dose of COVID-19 vaccines several months after the initial vaccines. In fact, what we have learned over the last year is that people who have had their primary series + a booster dose are much less likely to die of COVID-19 than those who just got the primary dose. (90% less likely to die, specifically).

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2115624

So yes! You really do need a booster. The updated booster is a great choice. Actually, if you’re in the US, it’s your only choice. If you haven’t had it, go get it. And yes, we feel for our U.K. friends who can’t get it until they’re age 50! Get with it, NHS!

We have about 80 patients in our clinic population with PANS/PANDAS. This is one of the many reasons why we continue to require masks. An asymptomatic person who has COVID can leave lingering viral particles in a patient room for an hour or more after they are gone, putting the next two patients at risk for infection.

We love having engaged learners working for us at Beehive Comprehensive Clinic. This comes with the downside that as our MAs move on to bigger and better things, like nursing school, they leave us. We are currently looking for a CNA, MA, EMT, or phlebotomist to fill full or part time, and/or a part time receptionist as our existing one is cross training. Please follow the links for more details on the positions.

bit.ly/BeehiveMA
bit.ly/BeehiveReception

Receptionist Job Posting Our busy family practice is seeking a part-time (20-24 hours) receptionist who is highly motivated, friendly, outgoing and professional, loves to learn, works well under pressure, and provides courteous and friendly patient care. Potential for full time hours in the future. Job Responsibilit...

Did you know that the state health department offers free community education classes on a variety of topics, including arthritis, diabetes, prediabetes, asthma, alzheimer's, and living with chronic pain? Check out their website: https://livingwell.utah.gov/

Living Well Utah

Q: Welp, I have COVID. When can I stop worrying about giving it to other people?

The short answer is: 10 days after you first felt sick or tested positive, assuming you’re feeling better by then. If you’re not better, consult your clinician about ending your isolation period.

There have been lots of updates to these guidelines for the time periods around COVID-19 exposures and infections, and reading them can feel like doing mental gymnastics. 🤸🏽‍♀️🤸🏽‍♀️🤸🏽‍♀️ Isolation... quarantine... 5 days… 24 hours… if-then-or-except… are you confused yet? Is that headache from the virus or from reading the CDC guidance?! 🤯

This post will focus on the guidance for ISOLATION. There is different (but similar-sounding) guidance for QUARANTINE, which we’ll briefly cover at the bottom of this post.
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ISOLATION: When you know (or suspect, because you are sick) you have COVID-19 and you’re trying to avoid giving it to anyone else by *isolating* yourself. Isolation means no sharing air or physical contact with other people, even the people you live with.
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After you start feeling sick (or receive a positive test), you should completely avoid contact with all other people--even the people you live with--for at least 5 days full days. Start counting from 0 on the first day you had symptoms. If you never have any symptoms, count from the date your positive test was administered.

If you have to breathe the same air as other people for any reason during isolation, you and the other people should wear a well-fitted N95 type mask (not a fabric mask) whenever you are in the same room.

We are aware that it is really not possible for parents to isolate from their children. Many of us are moms. We know. If the kids have COVID-19 or you do, it will be all but impossible to keep the whole household from getting sick. CDC does not officially offer guidance here, but our advice as moms and scientists is to *do your best* and *isolate as a unit*. If one kid is sick, do not send the other one to school. Assume everyone is either infected or incubating an infection until proven otherwise. 🤒

Meanwhile, do what you can to reduce transmission within your household. Wear masks 😷, crank up the air filters, don't share cups or utensils, and (to the extent that it is safe and possible) maintain physical distancing. If you have a very high-risk person in your household and they're not sick yet, consider isolating them from everyone else (if you can do so safely, obviously).
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5 full days from your first symptoms (or positive test, if you never had symptoms) you need to ask yourself if you’re feeling better. Feeling better sooner than 5 days is great news--good for you! But it does not mean your isolation can end before 5 days.

So if it has been 5 days, and you have not had a fever for a whole day (that is, 24 hours--without the help of fever-reducing medications), CDC guidance says you can end your isolation and move on to a strict mask-wearing phase.

For 5 MORE days, you should continue to 😷 😷 wear an N95 type mask 😷😷whenever you are around other people. An estimated 1 in 3 people is still infectious on day 5, so this mask-wearing phase is important.
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Situations:

😓 If you are not feeling better on the 5th day after you first had symptoms, you must wait until you start to get better. Once you’ve started to see improvement and you have been free of fever for 24 hours, you can move to the mask-wearing phase for 5 more days.

🏥 If you are still not feeling better after 10 days, or you were really sick (requiring hospital care), continue isolating and ask your clinician when you should end isolation.

➕ If you never had symptoms but only had a positive test, you still need to isolate for 5 days from the date you of the test, followed by 5 more days of strict mask-wearing. It doesn't matter if it was an antigen test or a PCR test.

➖😕➕ If you had a negative antigen test and a positive PCR test, isolate for 5 days followed by 5 more days of strict mask-wearing. If you have a positive antigen test and can’t get a PCR test, isolate for 5 days followed by 5 more days of strict mask-wearing. If you can't or won't test and you have any COVID-19 symptoms, you should isolate for 5 days followed by 5 more days of strict mask-wearing.

💪🩹 Vaccination will likely keep you out of the hospital, but it doesn’t matter for isolation rules. Whether you are fully vaccinated or not, if you start to feel ill or test positive (on an antigen or PCR test), the guidance is 5 days of isolation followed by 5 days of strict mask-wearing.

📅 If you have symptoms and a positive test on different days, start counting from the date of symptoms. We think. This is actually a little unclear in the CDC guidance. 🤪

👨‍👨‍👦 Multiple family members sick? Each person has their own isolation period starting from the first day THEY had symptoms (or a positive test).
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Strict mask-wearing means wearing a mask that fits well and has good filtration, such as an N95 mask. Strict mask-wearing means the mask is covering your 👄 mouth and 👃 nose at all times with no breaks for eating, drinking, smoking, applying chapstick, scratching your nose, talking on the phone, or doing anything else. Mask breaks should happen away from all other people.
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QUARANTINE is what we do after we find out that someone we shared air with ended up being positive for COVID-19. You’re feeling fine and haven’t tested positive, but you’re in this purgatory phase where you are waiting to see if you’ll get sick. ⌛

You only have to quarantine if you are not fully vaccinated. To quarantine, you should stay at home and wear a mask around other people for 5 days. Then, you should get tested on day 5 (or 6 or 7) after the exposure. If your test is negative, you can stop quarantining at home, but continue wearing a mask and monitoring for symptoms through day 10 after exposure. You should also avoid travel and avoid people who are high-risk during this time.

If you ARE fully vaccinated, you don’t have to quarantine but you should still get tested on days 5-7 after exposure, watch for symptoms, avoid travel and wear a mask until day 10.
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And of course, we need to remind you that we're explaining the CDC guidance here, not offering medical advice for your specific situation. Please consult your clinician with all your questions about your symptoms.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/your-health/quarantine-isolation.html

Really important information as we head into a week with a lot of family gatherings. Case counts in Utah remain in a high plateau, and the ICUs at state referral facilities were over 100 percent capacity at the end of last week. This is a bad position for our healthcare system to be entering the holiday season in. For those that are eligible for the booster (adults over 18, 6 months from your original series), please consider getting boosted ASAP. We continue to see a steady stream of COVID cases in our clinic, both vaccinated and unvaccinated, as antibody protection wanes. This includes those with prior COVID infections who were hopeful that natural immunity would suffice. The good news is that none of our vaccinated patients who had breakthrough cases have required hospital stays while numerous of our unvaccinated patients have. We have seen many cases of repeat infections as well, so just because you've had it before doesn't mean you don't need to be careful anymore.

Remember, many vaccinations we have used for decades require several doses spaced over time to achieve long term protection, and individual immune response to either an infection or a vaccine is unpredictable. Layered protection is still very important! My family and I (Heidi) continue to wear masks in public spaces to protect ourselves and those around us. Airborne infectious particles can remain suspended for 1-2 hours after someone speaks, coughs, sings, or sneezes unmasked, and those particles can infect through all mucus membranes, including the eyes. People can shed infection for a couple days before becoming symptomatic. This is why a susceptible person needs to be surrounded by other people being cautious. Healthy people with good immune systems - this is not about you! This is about the people who are around you. Be a good human and do your part.

Thanksgiving is this week. The best thing you can do for your health, the health of your family, and the health of the community is to test for COVID19 before gathering.

As I’ve mentioned before, if you have a fully vaccinated family (and I mean everyone), then this post isn’t for you. Celebrate as you would pre-pandemic. For the vast majority of us, this isn’t the case: we have partially vaccinated kids, we have immunocompromised, or we have unvaccinated adults and babies. This post is for you and your family…

By now, everyone is familiar with PCR tests. They are the gold standard and includes driving to a clinic, getting tested, and waiting a few days for results. While PCR tests are incredibly accurate, they are very expensive. They are also not very feasible. Unless you quarantine after a PCR, you’re not in a bubble. You can become infected while waiting for results. Also, they are certainly not useful for day-of decision making. Antigen tests are your best bet this week.

***What are antigen tests?***
Antigen tests (or also called rapid tests) are one of the best and most underutilized tools of this pandemic. Antigen tests detect SARS-CoV-2 proteins and are very good at picking up on the most infectious people—a window of ~3-10 days after exposure.

While you can get an antigen test at the doctors office or local urgent care, the best perk is that you don’t have to. You can test at home. You can buy them online (Walmart here) or go to your corner pharmacy (they sell out quickly, so you may need to try a few places). While they are cheaper than PCR’s, they are still ridiculously expensive for the average American to use on a weekly basis. I do think they are worth the investment this week.

***Accuracy***
Antigen tests are great at detecting highly infectious people. If you have the virus and test yourself during the first week of symptoms, you can expect the average antigen test to catch 78% to 97% of cases. If you have the virus and are asymptomatic, this percentage dips to about 44% to 70%. Test performance varies by brand and user.

These figures may sound a bit low, but the reality is not so bleak. When studies report on test performance, they compare antigen tests to PCR tests. PCR tests are incredibly sensitive. Too sensitive sometimes. They pick up many cases with only a whisper of virus left, not enough to be contagious. For Thanksgiving, we only care about cases with tons of virus (i.e. clearly contagious), so rapid tests will get the job done.

But there’s always a possibility of false negatives— meaning your test is negative but you actually have the virus— especially if you’re asymptomatic. Fortunately, these “false negatives” are far less likely when you’re contagious.

There is also the possibility of false positives—meaning your test is positive but you don’t actually have the virus— but this is much more rare. This happens once in every 100 to 200 tests (0.5% to 1%). So if 200 people take a rapid antigen test, 1 or 2 of them will be positive for COVID19 even though they aren’t.

Whether or not a positive test is a accurate depends on the COVID-19 risk level of the person taking the test. To make sense of your own positive test, consider your exposure level:
-Do you have symptoms?
-Do you have a known COVID19 contact?
-Is community transmission rate high? (Check here)
If any of these are “yes” then the likelihood of a false test becomes more and more slim. In other words, the antigen test is probably correct: You have COVID19 and are contagious. Tip: Many false positives are easy to spot because the line is very faint.

***Cadence***
To improve accuracy (and reduce the number of false positives and negatives), it’s recommended that people conduct at least two tests a week. Regular testing increases the chances of hitting the timing right. This is especially true with asymptomatic people, because without symptoms, you don’t know the optimal window of time for testing. This is actually why manufacturers often include two tests in each box instead of one.

***Proposal for Thanksgiving***
So, what does antigen testing look like this week? I put together a proposal that you and your family may find useful. This gives you the best chances to ensure that Delta isn’t at Thanksgiving.

This means everyone who wants to attend Thanksgiving takes two antigen tests:

1. Test on Tuesday at anytime
-If this is negative, don’t do anything until Thursday morning.
-If this is positive, this is a bit more difficult decision. This could be a true positive, meaning the family member is contagious. Or it could be false positive, which is less likely. What you do with a positive test at this point really depends on: vaccination status, family risk tolerance, number of unvaccinated at the event, etc. The safest and best thing you can do for your family and community is to stay home on Thursday. But, I can certainly see that being vaccinated and asymptomatic and positive at this point is disappointing and frustrating. Vaccinated people clear this virus much faster than unvaccinated people. So, is this test just the beginning or the end of the infectious window? You won’t know unless you take another test two days later…

2. Test Thursday morning. Everyone takes an antigen test before getting in their car to the event.
-If it’s negative, time to celebrate
-If it’s positive, stay home. Period.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving week.

Love, YLE and Dr. Chana Davis

Dr. Chana Davis, PhD is a brilliant scientist in Canada whose expertise lies in genetics, biomarkers, and diagnostics. She helped make sense of all the scientific literature on COVID19 antigen tests. She can be found at on Facebook, Insta, and Twitter.

“Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE)” is written by Dr. Katelyn Jetelina, MPH PhD— an epidemiologist, biostatistician, professor, researcher, wife, and mom of two little girls. During the day she has a research lab and teaches graduate-level courses, but at night she writes this newsletter. Her main goal is to “translate” the ever-evolving public health science so that people will be well-equipped to make evidence-based decisions, rather than decisions based in fear. This newsletter is free thanks to the generous support of fellow YLE community members. To support the effort, please subscribe here: https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/using-antigen-tests-for-thanksgiving?justPublished=true

Many of our patients have a neuropsychiatric disorder that is triggered by strep infections or other bacterial or viral infections. I would like to encourage involvement in research to help in the effort to better characterize these disorders and develop new treatments: https://neuroimmune.org/pans-research/

Participate in PANS Research: Kids & Adults | Neuroimmune Dr. Masterson, PhD, MPH, Univ. of Washington is conducting a large scale research study for kids & adults with PANS/PANDAS. Enroll today!

We are so excited to welcome Rob Davis as a new provider at Beehive Comprehensive Clinic! He will start seeing patients October 25th.

His bio:

I am board certified as a family nurse practitioner by the American Association of Nurse Practitioners. I received my Doctorate of Nursing Practice from the University of Utah and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Weber State University. My clinical background is largely based in neurology with a specific focus in headache and migraine. I have a passion for providing equitable and accessible healthcare for underserved communities such as the LGBTQ+ community and people of color by working to reduce health disparities within their community and promote positive long-term health outcomes. I strive to form collaborative and caring relationships with my patients through personal connection and full understanding of both internal and external factors that contribute to their overall health.

In my spare time, I love to travel, spend time with my cat Zoe and dog Simba, attend concerts with friends, try new foods, and enjoy quality time with my family and friends. I also love to work on personal health through spin classes, mindfulness, and yoga.

Do You Need To Wear A Mask Indoors Where You Live? Check This Map The CDC wants vaccinated people to wear masks indoors if the coronavirus is spreading widely where they live. Find out the level of virus transmission in your county.

On this World Mental Health Day, we revisit a past post on the potential for pandemic PTSD:

Q: “How can I prepare for the residual mental health impacts of Covid? I feel as if I will carry a PTSD of sorts.

Will I flinch every time I hear about a new virus? Will I spend the rest of my life on high alert waiting for the next pandemic?“

Nerdy Girl Dr. Aparna Kumar, a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, discusses the mental health aspects of re-entry:

😰 First, let’s talk about PTSD. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health diagnosis characterized by a cluster of symptoms that occur anywhere from a month to years following a traumatic event or repeated events. The interpretation of the event by the person or people experiencing it defines the response-in other words, no one can define what trauma means to another person-their interpretation and response is what matters.

🐅 Think of PTSD as a state of responding to things around you as if they are all threats, a perpetual fight or flight state. I am sure some of us can relate to this (Is that person next to me in line going to give me COVID-19? Will my groceries?). But remember what matters is the response-are you able to say, no the chance that I will get COVID-19 from my groceries is low or will you say, every single thing is a threat and I must respond to it. This is an unconscious process that happens in the body.

⛈️ To go a little deeper, the core features of PTSD are:
1-Intrusion (Thoughts, memories, or bodily symptoms that disrupt daily life)
2-Avoidance (Situations, people, or places trigger the traumatic memory or response and are avoided)
3-Negative Mood (Symptoms of anxiety or depression among other symptoms that may contribute to a negative outlook or view of the traumatic event or the broader world)
4-Hyperarousal (Remaining on edge and responding disproportionately to normal stressors-this can look like an exaggerated response, irritability, anger, reactivity, sleep disturbance, problems with focus and concentration, and bodily symptoms like increased heart rate)
5-Reliving (re-experiencing an event or having nightmares for example)

➡️ In the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, certainly we could imagine that a segment of the population will develop PTSD like symptoms. We actually know that COVID-19 survivors and people who have stayed in the ICU are experiencing more symptoms of PTSD than the general population. If you do feel you are experiencing PTSD symptoms, there are things you can do.

Focus on what you can control, regulate sleep, nutrition, and schedule, seek connections (safely) with others rather than isolate, exercise, and seek additional help like trauma focused therapies. The VA PTSD center has a great listing of resources for COVID-19: https://bit.ly/3f5HliT.

😟 And if you are not experiencing PTSD like symptoms, but may have a high level of anxiety, try out applying some of the mental health strategies we have talked about before on DearPandemic (https://bit.ly/3vRiq9x).

⬇️ If you are starting to re-enter society and more normal activities and have anxiety about it, a few ideas may help you.

1. Do something small. It can be a fifteen minute activity. Make a list of activities that are a priority for you and start with the easiest, safest one.

2. Do an activity now. Don’t wait! The longer you wait, the more chance you have to avoid it.

3. Make a buddy. Hold each other accountable to slowly getting back out there.

4. Slowly increase your activities. As you increase your exposure to different things, it is likely that your anxiety will decrease.

5. If you are still struggling, please seek support. Here is our previous suggestion of how to find a therapist (https://bit.ly/2RBuw7R). Employee assistance programs at large companies can also be a great place to start.

🔮 As to future events, we cannot predict what future threats (like pandemics) await us. But, by making small and subtle changes to support our own mental wellness and promote good strategies for anxiety management, we are building up our tool kit for whatever uncertain things will come our way.

🙏 A huge thank you to all of the amazing people out there who have helped us to make sense of this pandemic, to our followers who trust us to bring you this information, and to everyone who has helped us along the way.

Stay safe. Stay sane.


With love,
Those Nerdy Girls
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If you or someone you know is considering su***de, contact the National Su***de Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 (Español: 1-888-628-9454; Hearing Suport: 1-800-799-4889) or the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.

Q: How are possible side effects from COVID-19 vaccines evaluated and tracked? - Nancy from Denver

A: The vaccines have been shown to be safe (much safer than getting COVID-19!) and effective, but safety monitoring continues and remains a priority. Several existing and some new strategies were put in place to monitor the safety of COVID-19 vaccines. Below, get ready to wade through some acronyms and we’ll outline a few of these strategies.

➡Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS): This is a biggie. Co-managed by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), VAERS has been around since 1990. Anyone can report possible side effects from a vaccine through VAERS and healthcare workers are required to report certain side effects. The CDC and FDA use this data to monitor safety. Reports of serious concerns (like hospitalization, life threatening illness, death, or serious harm that could cause disability) are investigated by VAERS staff. It’s really important to remember that just because something was reported to VAERS, it does not necessarily mean that a vaccine caused that problem. VAERS is not designed to determine if a vaccine causes specific adverse effects (it can’t distinguish between correlation and causation). It is meant to be an “early warning tool” and to help identify possible trends that need more study. If a concern for a trend is found, other vaccine safety monitoring programs conduct studies.

➡V-Safe: This is the new kid on the block and was developed for the COVID-19 vaccines. V-Safe is a new smartphone-based tool. Once you get vaccinated, you are offered the opportunity to sign up for V-Safe. It will serve as your vaccination record card and help you report to the CDC if you develop any side effects from the vaccine. V-Safe also has a COVID-19 Vaccine Pregnancy registry to collect safety monitoring information from people who receive the vaccine just before or during pregnancy.

➡Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD): This is a longstanding collaboration between the CDC and 9 healthcare organizations from across the country (it’s been around since 1990). The VSD uses electronic health record data to answer questions about safety. When they are evaluating a possible side effect of a vaccine, the VSD looks at information on the vaccine (like which vaccine was given and when) and patient characteristics (like other health problems and ER or hospital visits) to pick out patterns. The VSD also will conduct studies based on potential concerns raised from reports made to VAERS.

➡Vaccine manufactures: The vaccine developers are still conducting their clinical trials and safety monitoring.

COVID-19 vaccine safety is the most intensely and systematically monitored in vaccine history. Serious side effects (like anaphylaxis, thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, and myocarditis) have been reported, are incredibly rare, and were identified using this really strong vaccine safety monitoring system, proving the system works as designed. After over 390 million doses administered in the US alone, all signs are showing that these vaccines are incredibly safe and effective.

In the US, the COVID-19 vaccine is recommended for everyone 12 years old and up. If you have questions about COVID-19 vaccines, please ask your primary care clinician. They can work with you to make sure that you have your questions and concerns addressed.

Stay Safe Out There!
Those Nerdy Girls

Links!

CDC Ensuring the Safety of Covid19 Vaccine in the US: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety.html

Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System: http://vaers.hhs.gov/. If you want instructions on how to review VAERS data yourself, check out this past DP post that will walk you through it: https://dearpandemic.org/data-on-vaccine-side-effects-from-v-safe/

Vaccine Safety Datalink: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/ensuringsafety/monitoring/vsd/index.html

V-Safe: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/vsafe.html

CDC Selected Adverse Events Reported after COVID-19 vaccination: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html