---
title: "HPV and HPV vaccine awareness in Indigenous communities of Northwest Territories, Canada"
id: "plos-one-12-human-papillomavirus-hpv-and-hpv-vaccine-awareness-in-indigenous-communities-in"
canonical_url: "https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/plos-one-12-human-papillomavirus-hpv-and-hpv-vaccine-awareness-in-indigenous-communities-in"
content_type: "clinical_feed_article"
specialty: "Infectious Disease"
source_name: "PLOS ONE (Medicine)"
source_url: "https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0357586"
published_at: "2026-09-03T14:00:00.000Z"
evidence_level: "Journal Feed"
license: "CC-BY-NC-4.0 / Informational Use"
---
# HPV and HPV vaccine awareness in Indigenous communities of Northwest Territories, Canada
## Provenance & Clinical Metadata
- **Canonical URL:** https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/plos-one-12-human-papillomavirus-hpv-and-hpv-vaccine-awareness-in-indigenous-communities-in
- **Specialty:** [Infectious Disease](https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/infectious-disease.md)
- **Primary Source:** PLOS ONE (Medicine)
- **Source URL:** [Original Journal Publication](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0357586)
- **Published At:** 2026-09-03T14:00:00.000Z
- **Evidence Rating:** Journal Feed
## Executive GIST (TL;DR)
- This community-based mixed-methods study assessed awareness of **HPV** and the **HPV vaccine** among Indigenous adults in 11 Northwest Territories (NWT) communities between 2022–2024. - A total of 221 participants (66.5% women; mean age 43.6 ± 13.9 years) completed semi-structured questionnaires administered by trained local research assistants. - Approximately half of participants had heard of **HPV**; fewer than one-third had heard of the **HPV vaccine**. Only 26.3% of participants aged up to 26 years reported having received the vaccine. - Education was strongly associated with HPV awareness (p < .000); lower educational attainment correlated with significantly reduced awareness. - Awareness of the **HPV vaccine** was predicted by age (p < .033), gender (p < .019), and education (p < .004): women, younger adults, and those with higher education were more likely to know about the vaccine. - Qualitative thematic analysis identified limited awareness and insufficient information about HPV and the vaccine as primary barriers to vaccination within communities. - Participants recommended enhanced outreach linking HPV to cancer prevention and expanded educational efforts in schools and community settings to improve vaccine uptake. - The study used a community-based participatory research model across communities varying by size and remoteness; some procedural details and full quantitative tables are presented in the source article. - Data are not publicly available due to potentially identifying information; access to de-identified data requires ethics review and community agreements as described in the source. - The authors conclude that tailored, targeted interventions are needed to increase **HPV vaccine** utilization in Indigenous communities in NWT.
## Clinical Analysis & Structured Key Points
Human papillomavirus (HPV) and HPV vaccine awareness in Indigenous communities in Northwest Territories, Canada | PLOS One Browse Subject Areas ? Click through the PLOS taxonomy to find articles in your field. For more information about PLOS Subject Areas, click here . Article Authors Metrics Comments Media Coverage Reader Comments Figures Figures Abstract Objectives Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a common sexually transmitted infection linked to several cancers, including cervical cancer, which ranks fourth in cancer incidence and mortality among women globally. Despite its significance, awareness of HPV and the HPV vaccine remains limited across many populations. This project assessed HPV and HPV vaccine awareness among Indigenous adults in Northwest Territories communities in Canada and explored factors influencing HPV vaccine utilization; such data have never been available or explored. Methods Using a community-based participatory research approach, quantitative and qualitative data were collected in 11 Indigenous communities in Northwest Territories. Indigenous adults aged 18 years and older were invited to complete a semi-structured questionnaire administered by trained local research assistants. Multiple logistic regression was used to examine potential associations among age, gender, education, and awareness of HPV and the HPV vaccine. A thematic analysis of qualitative data explored reasons for non-vaccination. Results Among the 221 participants (66.5% women; mean age 43.6 years (±13.9)), approximately half had heard of HPV, and fewer than one-third had heard of the HPV vaccine. Education emerged as a key factor, with individuals with lower educational attainment being significantly less aware of HPV (p 1000 people) are connected by all-season roads and have hospitals and community health centers staffed by permanent nurses. Medium-sized communities (300–1000 people) also maintain year-round road access and have community health centers, though are without hospital facilities. Smaller communities ( 5.0, tolerance 30 were applied to identify problematic collinearity. Confounding was evaluated using the change-in-estimate method: crude binary logistic regression models were fitted separately for each predictor, followed by a fully adjusted model including all predictors simultaneously. A change of ≥10% in the odds ratio between crude and adjusted models was used to identify confounding. Variables identified as confounders were retained in the final model. Results are presented as odds ratios (ORs) with corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs). All tests were two-sided, and p-values of 0.05 were considered statistically significant. For qualitative data, a thematic analysis approach was utilized. Two researchers independently reviewed the data multiple times, systematically coded them, and organized the codes into themes through an inductive analytical process. Results A total of 221 Indigenous community members participated in this project, with 120 participating in person and 101 by phone. The main indigenous identity (78.44%) was “First Nations”. Most participants (66.21%) were younger than 50 years old (n = 145), with a mean age of 43.60 years (±13.90), and 66.51% were women (n = 145). Regarding education, 57.14% of participants had completed some high school education (n = 124), while 24.88% had completed post-secondary education (n = 54). In terms of employment, 55.25% of participants reported being employed for pay (n = 121) ( Table 1 ). Download: PNG larger image TIFF original image Table 1. Demographic characteristics of participants in NWT (n = 221). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0357586.t001 Regarding awareness of HPV and the HPV vaccine, 49.52% (n = 103) of participants reported having heard of HPV, and 29.95% (n = 62) reported awareness of the HPV vaccine ( Table 2 ). Download: PNG larger image TIFF original image Table 2. Awareness of HPV and the HPV among adults in NWT (n = 221) a . https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0357586.t002 Before conducting the multiple logistic regression analysis, multicollinearity among the predictor variables (education level, age group, gender, parental status, and work status) was assessed. Although some pairwise associations between predictors were statistically significant in chi-square analyses, multicollinearity was not considered problematic. Variance inflation factors (VIFs) ranged from 1.13 to 1.75, tolerance values were all greater than 0.88, and the maximum condition index was 6.97, below the commonly accepted threshold of 30. These findings indicated that the predictor variables could be included simultaneously in the logistic regression model. Crude logistic regression models were fitted separately for each predictor and compared to the fully adjusted model. All four variables showed OR changes exceeding the 10% change threshold, indicating that each variable confounded the others. All four predictors were therefore retained in the final multivariable model. In the multiple logistic regression, education level emerged as a significant predictor of having heard of HPV. Individuals with elementary/middle school education (OR=0.09; 95% CI: 0.02–0.
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