Barriers to pediatric immunization: Parents’ perspective

Abstract

Purpose: The study was focused on the possible factors which can act as barriers in children immunization. It was conducted in a suburb comprising of multiethnic population with different demographic characteristics. Methods: The study was based on five questions associated with the childhood immunization and conducted in suburb of a Malaysian State. The study followed the evaluation criteria of Five points Likert Scale from ‘‘strongly disagree’’ to ‘‘strongly agree’’. SPSS version 20 was used for the analysis of data. Chi Square test and Fischer Exact Test were implied for analysis of data and the effect size was determined by Phi Cramers Value. Results: The study comprised of 396 parents of different locality and of different ethnicities. Three Muslim participants of Malay ethnicity has refused vaccination on the basis of their religious beliefs (P-Value = 0.031, Ф = 0.239). On the basis of importance of childhood vaccination, parents living in urban has shown better response than those living in rural areas (P-Value = <0.001, Ф = 0.299). A significant number of parents in postgraduate and graduate level of education has agreed to the statement that vaccination is a must for all the children (P-Value = >0.001). When asked about their trust in vaccines, parents living in urban area are more relaxed with those vaccines available since long time (P-Value = 0.009*). Conclusion Most of the parents trust their government and also trust the schedule provided by the government for childhood immunization. As noticed in some earlier studies, our study did not find any strong association of religion with the parents’ refusal, although a minor difference does exist on the basis of religious beliefs. Furthermore, educated parents always have shown faith in vaccines and understand its importance. Lastly, some barriers do exist which can be addressed and can be eradicated for acquiring 100% immunization coverage.