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Vaccinations
Vaccine Queries
Vaccines are required, pretty much from day one, for all your little bundles of joy. Staying informed will help you separate myths from facts, and help you make an informed decision about vaccines. Most parents have so many questions about this, so we have decided to address it in this post.
"In 1736 I lost one of my sons a fine boy of 4 Years old, by the Small Pox...I long regretted bitterly and I still regret that I had not given it to him by inoculation; this I mention for the sake of parents, who omit that operation on the supposition that they should never forgive themselves if a child died under it; my example showing that the regret may be the same either way, and that therefore the safer should be chosen." Benjamin Franklin Autobiography
Immunizations have saved the lives of hundreds of millions of kids worldwide, and are the single most important public health intervention. They protect us against many serious and deadly illnesses like small pox, measles, polio, diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis. Over the course of 12 years of intense vaccination campaign by the WHO (world health organization), Small Pox was eradicated. Through continued vaccination efforts the incidence of many illnesses has decreased by 83% - 100%. We have not had a case of wild virus polio in the United States since 1979 due to the development of the Salk and Sabin vaccines in the 50's.
As a practice, we follow the American Academy of Pediatrics. guidelines for vaccinating our patients. This decision did not come about lightly. Recently, we had an outbreak of measles (comes from the Latin word meaning .miserable.) in a group of children below 6 months at a pediatric office in San Diego. This happened because these children were exposed to an older child who came into the office to be seen for a fever and runny nose. Unfortunately, the child, who had not been vaccinated against measles, was diagnosed with it in the days following that visit. This necessitated the notification of all the people who were exposed to this child that day. Needless to say, this was not a pleasant thing for either the pediatrician or the parents, as the children needed to be quarantined for 3 weeks to see if they developed the disease. Measles is a very serious illness, especially in the very young. Measles caused 450 deaths and 4,000 cases of encephalitis in this country each year before a vaccine became available in the mid-1960s. It was a leading cause of infant mortality in the developing countries, until the invention of the measles vaccine.
We do not recommend any alternate schedule for vaccination, as there is no proven benefit to splitting vaccines. Please keep in mind that repeated visits to the office, even though it.s just for vaccines, puts your precious little ones at a higher risk of exposure to infections while at the office. It is nonetheless important to remember that most of these vaccine preventable illnesses are devastating if acquired by children under the age of 6 months, examples being Hemophilus Influenza or Pneumococcal meningitis. They cause irreparable damage to the brain and result in hearing loss and developmental disabilities. We would also like to minimize any vaccine errors that arise from preferential schedules. In an effort to keep our patients safe from the time they enter our waiting room we require that all our patients be vaccinated against all the vaccine preventable illnesses as per the schedule recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics. We would like to reassure you that most of the data so far points to no correlation between vaccines and autism.
We hope the following sites or books will help you in your quest for information pertaining to vaccinating your child.
BOOKS:
Autism's False Prophets: Bad Science, Risky Medicine and the Search for a Cure
- Dr. Paul Offit
The Saturday Shot - A Nellie Park Adventure
- Morgan Thomas
Do Vaccines Cause That?! A Guide for Evaluating Vaccine Safety Concerns
- Martin G. Myers, MD, and Diego Pineda and published in 2008
The Pink Book - a comprehensive vaccine guide by the CDC
PUBLICATIONS:
Offit PA, Moser CA.
The Problem With Dr. Bob's Alternative Vaccine Schedule
Pediatrics 2009 Jan;123(1):164-9.
Offit PA, Quarles J, Gerber MA, Hackett CJ, Marcuse EK, Kollman TR, Gellin BG, Landry S.
Addressing parents. concerns: Do multiple vaccines overwhelm or weaken the infant's immune system?
Pediatrics 2002 Jan;109(1):124-9.
Offit PA, Hackett CJ.
Addressing parents' concerns: Do vaccines cause allergic or autoimmune diseases?
Pediatrics 2003 Mar;111(3):653-9.
Offit PA, Jew RK.
Addressing parents' concerns: Do vaccines contain harmful preservatives, adjuvants, additives, or residuals?
Pediatrics 2003 Dec;112(6):1394-7.
WEBSITES:
www.aap.org
www.chop.edu
www.cdc.gov
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