Essay on New Parents' Decisions on Vaccination: Study at Yale's New Haven Hospital

Introduction

The study explores how other factors alongside trust tend to influence the decisions made by new parents in regard to vaccination for their newborns. The article highlights that the study was carried out in New Haven Hospital at Yale between May 2002 and July 2003, in which thirty-three mothers took part during the first interview. Nineteen mothers participated in the interviews, which were for follow up. All the interview consisted of questions which were open-ended that paid more attention to the attitude of the mothers towards vaccination, their knowledge when it comes to vaccination, and how they made decisions. They believe among the researchers is that having trust is essential between the medical professionals and the mothers when making decisions on whether to have their newborn vaccinated or not.

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Summary

The study by Benin et al. was broken into two distinct phases, with the first one being the initial interview conducted a few days upon giving birth involving mothers between 19 years and 43 years of age who were mainly from the suburban areas and inner cities. The number of white others amounted to 22, blacks were 8, and 3 were Hispanic. The study grouped the mothers into two broad groups and four subgroups, in which the two groups were the vaccinators, which comprises of 25 mothers while the other group had eight mothers and were non-vaccinators. The subgroups comprise of the vaccine-hesitant, rejectors, acceptors, and the late vaccinators.

The article mainly analyses the attitude of the mothers towards the vaccination, their knowledge of vaccination, and what influences their decisions. In regards to attitude towards accepting the vaccination, 20 acceptors were registered, five vaccine-hesitant, five rejectors, and three late-vaccinators. Those who accepted the vaccine had a positive attitude towards it, and they place a lot of trust in the professional doctors as the source of their information. The rejectors, on the other hand, trust non-medical people, books, and magazines as the source of their information. The vaccine-hesitant and the late vaccinators had a lot of questions regarding the vaccines being administered. Among the mothers, their knowledge of vaccination varied greatly hence the variation in their response rate. The researchers concluded that a lack of knowledge regarding vaccination was not the only factor for accepting or rejecting a vaccination. They concluded that information sources, the inhibitors, and the promoters' vaccination acceptance. The inhibitors might include the close relationship people who are against vaccination, while promoters involve having vaccination as a norm with the society. The study, however, concluded that trust was essential between the doctors and the mothers in making decisions whether to vaccinate the newborn children or not.

The Critique of the Article

Evidently, a few weaknesses are noticeable in the conducted study. Among them include the total participants, the few responses in regards to the interviews for the follow-up. Only 33 mothers took part in the study, and this may not be a large sample, enough to lead to the conclusion made by the researchers of the factors which are critical for the decision making by the mothers when it comes to vaccinating their newborn. Attaining responses for interviews for follow up may be out for the researchers' control. The initial level of participants dropped to 19, and this was not adequate to give qualitative data. The study mentions the involvement of black mothers for reasons not clear instead of just picking the participants from the various local hospitals to take part in the study since this would have led to the high number of participants requires to give qualitative data. A high number of participants is crucial for the authentication of the findings.

The study also enumerates various strength, and these include the use of the open-ended questions for the interview, and over the phone interviews for follow-ups. The picking up of participants was crucial, and the participants were not swayed in any way. Open-ended questions provided the explanations by the mothers regarding what they believed in about the vaccines and their previous encounters. The researcher also switched to selected participants from the random selection to find the non-vaccinators. The researchers requested the medical professionals to consider referring mothers to them, and this also included the black mothers in their study. The mothers were not informed of the benefit associated with vaccination in order not to sway them to any side. The mothers consequently formed a relationship with the doctors, creating an atmosphere for them to share their experience. The researchers were successful in getting the information they deeply needed from the late vaccinators and the vaccine-hesitant since they were willing to be open in order to gain knowledge of vaccination. The aim of this is to get an accurate and honest response needed to help the researchers draw a conclusion.

Despite the study being conducted between the years 2002 and 2003, it still has much relevance today and provides information on the factors that influence the decision made by mothers in relation to vaccination. Certain incidence of measles have occurred in recent years and has been attributed to the non-vaccinators. There is a great need to examine why some parents choose not to vaccine their children. Most of the terms in the study, such as acceptors, vaccinators, promoters have also been defined to aid in the understanding of the study. Additionally, figures and charts have also been used to explain more the terms and the findings. The study has been successful in responding to the issue surrounding the reasons for mothers not to the vaccine and the key factor, which is trust, as being responsible for a mother to make the decision to vaccinate.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the essential element to deduce from the study is the aspect of trust between the mothers and the pediatricians. The relationship is key in influencing the level of openness on the part of the mothers. Through trust, mothers are able to express their fears and the reasons for not preferring to vaccine their children. It is clear that communication comes slowly and should not be rushed or forced for people to be open. The discussion of vaccines enhances the confidence level of the parents on the information provided by the pediatricians. Despite the fact that the study is small, it pins points the critical elements that need to be proven by further studies. The main weakness of the study is the few numbers of participants, and this should be addressed in the subsequent studies aimed at furthering this study. Additionally, participants should be selected randomly without particular mentioning of their ethnic inclination.

Reference

Benin A, et al. Qualitative analysis of mothers' decision-making about vaccines for infants: the importance of trust. Pediatrics. 2006; 117(5): 1532-154