1Associate Professor, Department of Community Medicine, Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Sri Amritsar
2Professor, Department of Community Medicine, Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Sri Amritsar
*Corresponding Author: Dr. Pooja Sadana, Associate Professsor, Department of Community Medicine, Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Sri Amritsar
Online published on 23 December, 2019.
Childhood immunization almost guarantees protection from several diseases. Since parents are the important health decision makers of their children, their knowledge regarding immunization and their educational status have a great impact in the immunization status of their children. This study evaluates the knowledge among parents/care givers about vaccines, to understand their perception towards immunization and to identify solutions to address the knowledge gap.
The objectives of this study were to assess the knowledge of parents or caregivers regarding immunization and to establish a correlation between socio-demographic variables and knowledge about immunization.
The study was conducted in Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Vallah, Amritsar. Parents or care givers who came to the immunization clinic of the hospital to vaccinate their children were interviewed by a self-designed questionnaire. Each parent or caregiver's knowledge, was assessed by giving specific scoring to selected questions in the questionnaire. Significance of difference in parameters was calculated using Chi-square test at 95% confidence interval.
Out of 130 parents/caregivers studied, 6.9% of the parents/caregivers had good knowledge, 63.9% had average knowledge and 29.2% had poor knowledge about immunization. The association between knowledge and educational status (p = 0.002), type of family (p = 0.006), birth order (p = 0.030) and relation of the child with the caregiver (p = 0.020) were found to be statistically significant.
Majority of the subjects did not have adequate knowledge on vaccination. Socio-demographic factors had a significant influence on the knowledge of the caregiver. There is an urgent need to increase the coverage of vaccines under Universal Immunization Programme and a dire need to arrange for health education programme for all the parents regarding the importance of complete adherence of vaccination among children.
Parents, Caregiver, Knowledge, Socio-demographic factors
