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Parental Perceptions about Required Influenza Immunization

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2015

Sim Sai Tin*
Affiliation:
Medical Center, Shantou, China
Viroj Wiwanitkit
Affiliation:
Visiting professor, Hainan Medical University, China
*
Address correspondence to Sim Sai Tin, MD, Medical Center, Shantou, China ([email protected]).
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Abstract

Type
Letters to the Editor
Copyright
© 2015 by The Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America. All rights reserved 

To the Editor—We would like to discuss the article “Parental Perceptions about Required Influenza Immunization.”Reference Linam, Gilliam, Honeycutt, Wisdom, Swearingen and Romero1 Linam et al. noted that “independent of their feelings regarding vaccine safety and efficacy, 76% of parents felt that annual influenza vaccination should be required for HCP [healthcare professionals].”Reference Linam, Gilliam, Honeycutt, Wisdom, Swearingen and Romero1 In fact, parents of pediatric patients usually require the best thing, best safety service, for their children. A vaccinated HCP is perceived to be a safe person to provide health care to the children with low risk for influenza transmission. In addition, the relationship between the status of “vaccinated or intending to be vaccinated against seasonal influenza” of an HCP is also directly related to the status of “recommending universal pediatric seasonal influenza vaccine.”Reference Grossman, Berkovitch, Braunstein, Cohen and Mirons2 This means if the HCP is vaccinated, it is likely that he or she will educate the parent and patient and recommend that they get the vaccine. Nevertheless, there is a previous report indicating highly educated parents have a trend of negative attitude towards vaccination.Reference Hak, Schönbeck, De Melker, Van Essen and Sanders3 An interesting question is whether the education of the parents affects the perception on this specific issue or not.

Acknowledgments

Financial support.

None reported.

Potential conflicts of interest.

All authors report no conflicts of interest relevant to this article.

References

1.Linam, WM, Gilliam, CH, Honeycutt, M, Wisdom, C, Swearingen, CJ, Romero, JR. Parental perceptions about required influenza immunization of pediatric healthcare personnel. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 2014;35:13011303.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
2.Grossman, Z, Berkovitch, M, Braunstein, R, Cohen, HA, Mirons, D. Influenza vaccination of pediatric staff as a predictor for recommendations to children. Harefuah 2012;151:342345, 378.Google ScholarPubMed
3.Hak, E, Schönbeck, Y, De Melker, H, Van Essen, GA, Sanders, EA. Negative attitude of highly educated parents and health care workers towards future vaccinations in the Dutch childhood vaccination program. Vaccine 2005;23:31033107.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed