The incidence of cancers attributable to Human Papillomavirus (HPV) that affect males is on the rise. Currently in the UK teenage boys are not vaccinated against HPV while teenage girls are. The rationale for not vaccinating boys is that vaccinating girls should provide herd immunity to boys, however this does not protect men who have sex with men or men who have sex with unvaccinated women. The issue of whether to vaccinate boys or not is a controversial one with considerable lobbying taking place to change the existing policy. On one side of the debate are financial considerations while on the other side health equality is important. One avenue that has not been presented is the parental perspective. The current study uses a self-report questionnaire to explore what parents of teenage boys know about HPV and the vaccine and whether they want the vaccine for their sons. Only half of the parents had heard of HPV prior to completing the survey. Of those who had heard of HPV, knowledge about the health sequelae of HPV for men was poor relative to their knowledge about its impact on female health. Parents who would be willing to vaccinate their sons had higher levels of knowledge about HPV than those parents who would be unwilling or unsure. Irrespective of whether they had previously heard of HPV or not, once provided with a brief description of HPV, the majority of parents thought that boys should be offered the vaccination. There is a pressing need for public education about the potential impact of HPV on male health in order to facilitate uptake of the vaccine in the event of the vaccination programme being extended to men or to facilitate informed decision making about seeking the vaccine privately in the event that it isn’t.

SUMMARYWe conducted a survey to explore levels of awareness and knowledge of HPV and cervical cancer in 170 female students and whether mode of data collection (online vs. paper) affected the results. 27% of women named HPV as a cause of cervical cancer with online respondents more likely to do so. 75% of women had heard of HPV. More online respondents had heard of HPV than paper respondents. 127 women reported having heard of HPV, with a mean knowledge score of 2.989 (SD = 1.599). Online respondents scored higher (3.57, SD = 1.316) than paper respondents (2.688, SD = 1.591). Knowledge and awareness of HPV and its link to cervical cancer appear to have increased which may be related to the HPV vaccination programme. However, there is still a considerable number of women with little to no knowledge of HPV. Online surveys may result in an inflated estimation of awareness and knowledge.

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The incidence of cancers attributable to Human Papillomavirus (HPV) that affect males is on the rise. Currently in the UK teenage boys are not vaccinated against HPV while teenage girls are. The rationale for this is that vaccinating girls should provide herd immunity to boys, however this does not protect men who have sex with men or men who have sex with unvaccinated women. The issue of whether to vaccinate boys or not is a controversial one with considerable lobbying taking place to change the existing policy. On one side of the debate are financial considerations while on the other side health equity is important. One avenue that has not been presented is the parental perspective. The current study uses a self-report questionnaire to explore what parents of teenage boys know about HPV and the vaccine and whether they want the vaccine for their sons. Only half of the parents had heard of HPV prior to completing the survey. Of those who had heard of HPV, knowledge about the health sequelae of HPV for men was poor relative to their knowledge about its impact on female health. Parents who would be willing to vaccinate their sons had higher levels of knowledge about HPV than those parents who would be unwilling or unsure. Irrespective of whether they had previously heard of HPV or not, once provided with a brief description of HPV, the majority of parents thought that boys should be offered the vaccination. There is a pressing need for public education about the potential impact of HPV on male health in order to facilitate uptake of the vaccine in the event of the vaccination programme being extended to men or to facilitate informed decision making about seeking the vaccine privately in the event that it isn’t.

Despite National Health Service Cervical Screening Programme guidelines, not all clinicians offer review meetings to patients and those who do offer them do not always offer them to all women. Patient research needs to be conducted to explore the value of the meetings further, and there is a need to do more to engage clinicians in the process.