TELEPHONE REMINDER SYSTEMS TO RAISE VACCINATION COMPLETION RATES

Tuesday, 10th of January 2012

Paediatr Child Health. 2011 Jan;16(1):e1-5.

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF TELEPHONE REMINDERS AND HOME VISITS TO IMPROVE MEASLES, MUMPS AND RUBELLA IMMUNIZATION COVERAGE RATES IN CHILDREN.

As mobile phones become ubiquitous in much of Africa and Asia, it is surprising that telephone reminders are not commonly used to cut infant vaccination dropout rates.

Lemstra M, Rajakumar D, Thompson A, Moraros J.

Full text is at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3043026/?tool=pubmed

Source

Department of Pediatrics, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

Abstract

INTRODUCTION:

In the Saskatoon Health Region (Saskatchewan), only 67.4% of children overall are fully immunized for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) at 24 months of age, with only 43.7% of low-income children fully immunized.

METHODS:

Parents of children who were behind in MMR immunizations were contacted to determine knowledge about, beliefs toward and barriers to immunization. The effectiveness of a telephone reminder system in improving immunization rates in a health region compared with a control health region was determined. Finally, the effectiveness of telephone reminders versus telephone reminders combined with home visits in improving child immunization coverage rates in low-income neighbourhoods was compared.

RESULTS:

The survey was completed by 629 parents (69% response rate). Of those, 81.8% were not aware that their child was behind in immunizations. In the Saskatoon Health Region, the MMR immunization coverage increased from 67.4% to 74.0% in the first year of intervention (rate ratio = 1.10; 95% CI 1.08 to 1.12). All four neighbourhood groupings (three urban by income and one rural) had relative increases ranging from 9% to 11%. The control health region observed an immunization coverage increase from 66.5% to 69.2% in the first year (rate ratio = 1.04; 95% CI 1.01 to 1.07). The three low-income neighbourhoods with only telephone reminders had an immunization coverage rate of 48.7% (95% CI 39.5% to 57.8%). The three low-income neighbourhoods that received a telephone reminder and home visit had an immunization coverage rate of 60.5% (95% CI 52.5% to 68.6%).

CONCLUSION:

Telephone reminder systems have some benefit in increasing child immunization coverage rates.