Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Pediatrician's Guide to Discussing Research with Patients pp 97–112Cite as

Vaccines

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

  • 534 Accesses

Abstract

Vaccines have saved an untold number of lives, yet since their inception, a proportion of the population has displayed hesitancy toward them. Vaccine hesitancy manifests as a wide range of behaviors, from reluctantly vaccinating to outright vaccine refusal. Concerns among vaccine hesitant parents are heterogeneous and change in accordance with contemporary fears in the social milieu. The Internet contributes to the current spate of hesitancy by facilitating the spread of misinformation and hosting passionate personal appeals from individuals without medical training to refuse vaccines. This chapter outlines the current vaccine myths. These fears and misconceptions, as well as the evidence needed to respond to them, are covered in detail. In an attempt to help their patients and contribute to herd immunity rates, physicians often attempt to correct misconceptions or emphasize the negative outcomes associated with vaccine delay or refusal. Regrettably, these methods are observed to inadvertently strengthen parents’ vaccine fears rather than assuage them. Still other physicians may avoid in-depth discussions for concern it will harm the doctor–patient relationship. We review more effective means of discussing vaccines with parents.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Kennedy A, LaVail K, Nowak G, Basket M, Landry S. Confidence about vaccines in the United States: understanding parents’ perceptions. Health Aff. 2011;30(6):1151–9.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Smith PJ, Humiston SG, Marcuse EK, Zhao Z, Dorell CG, Howes C, Hibbs B. Parental delay or refusal of vaccine doses, childhood vaccination coverage at 24 months of age, and the Health Belief Model. Public Health Rep. 2011;126(Suppl 2):135.

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  3. Opel DJ, Mangione-Smith R, Taylor JA, Korfiatis C, Wiese C, Catz S, Martin DP. Development of a survey to identify vaccine-hesitant parents: the parent attitudes about childhood vaccines survey. Human vaccines. 2011;7(4):419–25.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  4. Larson HJ, Jarrett C, Eckersberger E, Smith DM, Paterson P. Understanding vaccine hesitancy around vaccines and vaccination from a global perspective: a systematic review of published literature, 2007–2012. Vaccine. 2014;32(19):2150–9.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Bandura A. Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychol Rev. 1977;84(2):191–215.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Taylor JA, Cufley D. The association between parental health beliefs and immunization status among children followed by private pediatricians. Clin Pediatr. 1996;35(1):18–22.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Williams SE, Rothman RL, Offit PA, Schaffner W, Sullivan M, Edwards KM. A randomized trial to increase acceptance of childhood vaccines by vaccine-hesitant parents: a pilot study. Acad Pediatr. 2013;13(5):475–80.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  8. Cdc.gov. National, State, and Selected Local Area Vaccination Coverage Among Children Aged 19–35 Months—United States, 2014. 2016 http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6433a1.htm Accessed 26 Jan 2016.

  9. Kempe A, Daley MF, McCauley MM, Crane LA, Suh CA, Kennedy AM, Basket MM, Stokley SK, Dong F, Babbel CI, Seewald LA. Prevalence of parental concerns about childhood vaccines: the experience of primary care physicians. Am J Prev Med. 2011;40(5):548–55.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. American Academy of Pediatrics. Immunization Resources Addressing Common Concerns of Vaccine-Hesitant Parents. 2016 https://www.aap.org/en-us/Documents/immunization_vaccine-hesitant%20parent_final.pdf Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  11. McCauley MM, Kennedy A, Basket M, Sheedy K. Exploring the choice to refuse or delay vaccines: a national survey of parents of 6-through 23-month-olds. Acad Pediatr. 2012;12(5):375–83.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  12. Rapp ID, Braasch JL, Ecker UK, Swire B, Lewandowsky S. Correcting Misinformation—A Challenge for Education and Cognitive Science.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Chop.edu. Too Many Vaccines? What you should know. 2016. http://www.butlercountyohio.org/health/content/documents/Can%20We%20Get%20Too%20Many%20Vaccines.pdf Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  14. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Parent’s Guide to Childhood Immunizations. 2016. http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/parents-guide/downloads/parents-guide-508.pdf Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  15. Chop.edu. Vaccines and Autism: What you should know. 2016. http://www.immune.org.nz/sites/default/files/resources/ConcernVaccinesAutismChop2012.pdf Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  16. Chop.edu. Vaccine Ingredients: What you should know. 2016. https://vec.chop.edu/export/download/pdfs/articles/vaccine-education-center/vaccine-ingredients.pdf Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  17. HealthyChildren.org. Vaccine Ingredients: Frequently Asked Questions. 2016. https://www.healthychildren.org/English/safety-prevention/immunizations/Pages/Vaccine-Ingredients-Frequently-Asked-Questions.aspx Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  18. Chop.edu. Vaccine Ingredients – Thimerosal| The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. 2016. http://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/vaccine-ingredients/thimerosal#.Vp6cdk-bGNl Accessed 19 Jan 2016.

  19. Offit PA, Coffin SE. Communicating science to the public: MMR vaccine and autism. Vaccine. 2003;22(1):1–6.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Rao TS, Andrade C. The MMR vaccine and autism: sensation, refutation, retraction, and fraud. Indian J Psychiatry. 2011;53(2):95.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  21. Offit PA. Why are pharmaceutical companies gradually abandoning vaccines? Health Aff. 2005;24(3):622–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Lam B. Vaccines Are Profitable, So What? The Atlantic. 2015. http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/02/vaccines-are-profitable-so-what/385214/ Accessed 31 Jan 2016.

  23. Nyhan B, Reifler J. Does correcting myths about the flu vaccine work? an experimental evaluation of the effects of corrective information. Vaccine. 2015;33(3):459–64.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  24. MacDonald NE. Vaccine hesitancy: definition, scope and determinants. Vaccine. 2015 Apr 17.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Betsch C, Böhm R, Chapman GB. Using behavioral insights to increase vaccination policy effectiveness. Policy Insights from the Behav Brain Sci. 2015;2(1):61–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Opel DJ, Heritage J, Taylor JA, Mangione-Smith R, Salas HS, DeVere V, Zhou C, Robinson JD. The architecture of provider-parent vaccine discussions at health supervision visits. Pediatrics. 2013;132(6):1037–46.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  27. Freed GL, Clark SJ, Butchart AT, Singer DC, Davis MM. Parental vaccine safety concerns in 2009. Pediatrics. 2010;125(4):654–9.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  28. Gellin BG, Maibach EW, Marcuse EK. Do parents understand immunizations? A national telephone survey. Pediatrics. 2000;106(5):1097–1102.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  29. Gust DA, Darling N, Kennedy A, Schwartz B. Parents with doubts about vaccines: which vaccines and reasons why. Pediatrics. 2008;122(4):718–25.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  30. Mahdi JG, Mahdi AJ, Bowen ID. The historical analysis of aspirin discovery, its relation to the willow tree and antiproliferative and anticancer potential. Cell Prolif. 2006;39(2):147–55.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  31. Stratton K, Gable A, Shetty P, McCormick M, editors. Institute of Medicine. Immunization safety review: measles-mumps-rubella vaccine and autism. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. 2001.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Lewandowsky S, Ecker UK, Seifert CM, Schwarz N, Cook J. Misinformation and its correction continued influence and successful debiasing. Psychol Sci Public Interest. 2012;13(3):106–31.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  33. Lewandowsky S, Gignac GE, Oberauer K. The role of conspiracist ideation and worldviews in predicting rejection of science. PLoS ONE. 2013;8(10):e75637.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  34. Lewandowsky S, Gignac GE, Oberauer K. The robust relationship between conspiracism and denial of (climate) science. Psychol Sci. 2015;26(5):667–70.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  35. Lewandowsky S, Oberauer K, Gignac GE. NASA faked the moon landing—therefore, (climate) science is a hoax an anatomy of the motivated rejection of science. Psychol Sci. 2013;24(5):622–33.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  36. Betsch C, Sachse K. Debunking vaccination myths: strong risk negations can increase perceived vaccination risks. Health Psychol. 2013;32(2):146.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  37. Nyhan B, Reifler J, Richey S, Freed GL. Effective messages in vaccine promotion: a randomized trial. Pediatrics. 2014;133(4):e835–42.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  38. Nyhan B, Reifler J. When corrections fail: the persistence of political misperceptions. Polit Behav. 2010;32(2):303–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Child Study Center, NYU Langone Medical Center, New York, New York, USA

    Christina A. Di Bartolo

  2. Department of Pediatrics, The Mount Sinai Hospital, New York, New York, USA

    Maureen K. Braun

Authors
  1. Christina A. Di Bartolo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Maureen K. Braun
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christina A. Di Bartolo .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Di Bartolo, C.A., Braun, M.K. (2017). Vaccines. In: Pediatrician's Guide to Discussing Research with Patients. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49547-7_6

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49547-7_6

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-49546-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-49547-7

  • eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation