Question

"Factors influencing vaccine completion rate "

Answer 1

ANSWER:

Vaccination is considered one of the most important and cost-effective services for children [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. Significant progress has been made towards the development of effective national immnunisation programmes and major contributor to this success is WHO(world Health organization), UNICEF ( United Nation's Children's Fund, and GAVI (Global Alliance Vaccine Initiative).

FACTOR's influencing / associated with Vaccination are :

1) Factor's relating to family charecteristics such as Maternal / Paternal ethnicity, maternal / paternal occupation, maternal / paternal education were associated with full vaccination of the children.Many studies have shown that maternal eductation or literacy is positively associated with the vaccination status of children, such as complete and timely immunisations

2) Health system and health service utilization factors such as time taken to reach the nearest health facilities, birth place of the children, and vaccination within the hospital setting or as part of an outreach activity were associated with full vaccination completion status. Evidence shows an association between the vaccination status and the location where caretakers or children receive health care services.

3) Source of information regarding the vaccination from the vaccination card or radio/TV, and notification of the vaccination date by medical staff, family members, friends, radio/TV were also associated with full vaccination status. A number of studies found that comprehensive and appropriate information provision and access to information affect vaccination status.

Conclusion:

This study found that proportion of infants who were fully immunised was still lower than the national target and maternal ethnicity, paternal education and notification of the vaccination date by medical staff were associated with full vaccination status. It also found that TV, Radio, Posters were underutilized sources of information on vaccination programs or on vaccination date notification.This finding suggest that targetted and culturally acceptable sub-group specific messages, using appropriate means of communication are necessary.

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