Little Rivers Health Care is proud to celebrate Maureen B. Boardman, DNP, FNP-C, FAANP, our Director of Clinical Quality and Research, whose work on HPV vaccination in rural communities was recently featured by the St. Jude HPV Cancer Prevention Program.

Maureen's article, "Closing the HPV Vaccination Gap One Visit at a Time," was published in the St. Jude program's July 2026 news series and shared through their newsletter, On the Path to Prevention. In it, she draws on more than two decades of experience with HPV vaccine research and rural primary care to make the case that HPV vaccination remains one of the most underused tools we have for cancer prevention.

Read Maureen's full article: Closing the HPV Vaccination Gap One Visit at a Time | St. Jude Research

See it featured in the St. Jude HPV Cancer Prevention Program newsletter: On the Path to Prevention | July 2026

A career rooted in HPV research

Maureen's interest in the HPV vaccine began over 20 years ago at Dartmouth, where she worked alongside Diane Harper, MD, an investigator in some of the earliest clinical trials of prophylactic HPV vaccines. That early exposure grew into a career-long focus: Maureen went on to serve as a primary investigator on an NIH grant examining clinician and patient use of the expanded HPV vaccine age range and shared decision-making, and she built her Doctor of Nursing Practice project around educating clinical staff on the same topic.

Why the gap matters

As Maureen explains, the numbers tell a sobering story. Only 59 percent of 13- to 15-year-olds in the U.S. have completed the HPV vaccine series, with even lower coverage in rural communities like the ones Little Rivers serves. By comparison, vaccines given around the same age, like Tdap and meningitis, reach close to 90 percent of adolescents. That gap represents missed opportunities for cancer prevention, particularly in areas like ours where access and outreach already face added barriers.

A practical solution: the Announcement Approach

Maureen highlights a simple, evidence-based strategy that any clinician can use: the Announcement Approach. Rather than opening the door to a lengthy debate, providers present the HPV vaccine the same way they present Tdap or meningitis vaccines, as a routine, expected part of care. This straightforward shift in language has been shown to increase HPV vaccine initiation among adolescents by 5 percent, making back-to-school visits a key window of opportunity.

Maureen pursued formal training as an Announcement Approach facilitator through the St. Jude HPV Cancer Prevention Program and has since brought the approach into her own practice at Little Rivers. She has also shared it beyond our walls, training more than 125 students in medicine, nursing, physician assistant studies, and public health at the Rural Health Student Summit hosted by the New England Rural Health Association.

A voice for rural health nationally

Maureen's expertise recently earned her a spot as a featured panelist in Part 1 of the Improving HPV Vaccination in Rural Communities communication series, organized by the St. Jude HPV Cancer Prevention Program, the American Cancer Society, and the ACS National HPV Vaccination Roundtable. Her session focused on practical strategies for implementing the Announcement Approach in rural practice, complementing Part 2's focus on motivational interviewing for families with questions about the vaccine.

With her DNP now complete at the University of New Hampshire, Maureen is looking ahead to expanding Announcement Approach training across rural New England, work that builds on her 21 years at Little Rivers, her role as Clinical Assistant Professor at Dartmouth's Geisel School of Medicine, and her national work with organizations including the CDC's National Nurse Vaccine Confidence Project.

We're grateful for Maureen's leadership and for the difference this work makes for patients and families across Orange and Caledonia Counties.