Article in Japanese

Determining the need for immunization education by attending pediatricians by evaluating mothers' awareness of childhood immunization at the 1 month well-child visits

Akiyoshi NARIAI, Yumiko MIYAJI, Taichi KANETAKA

Over the period January 2009 to December 2009 questionnaires were administered to 1035 mothers at the time of the 1 month well-child visits. Although 95% of mothers indicated that they thought vaccines are a good way to protect their children from diseases 64% of 552 primiparae had not previously read any exposition about vaccines and 84% had not received any education about childhood immunization. Furthermore, only 5.4% of the mothers were aware of the Hib vaccine which had been introduced to Japan in December 2008. At the time of the 1 month well-child visits the overwhelming majority of primparae did not have accurate and available information about childhood immunization.
In Japan, there is not a systematic method of informing mothers of immunization issues and available vaccines for children. Therefore attending pediatricians should consider their role and responsibility in informing mothers about these matters. Attending pediatricians have the responsibility to explain vaccines for children at the time of the 1 month well-child visits.

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Department of Pediatrics, Yokohama Minami Kyosai Hospital

Key words
Received	September 1, 2010
Accepted	January 20, 2011

23 (2)：135─140,2011