Vaccinations have become another hotly debated topic, however, Psychologist and Research Expert Polly Palumbo along with Dr. Lawrence Kagan remind us that the study that caused this vaccine scare has been widely debunked and disproved. Vaccinations in children help protect countless individuals from disease and are completely safe, so don’t procrastinate, get your child vaccinated sooner than later. Something more substantial to consider would be having one shot per visit rather than having a child deal with multiple shots, which could have psychological effects.
Transcript:
- The idea that vaccines cause Autism has been roundly refeuded in a large body of scientific research, both here in the U.S. and abroad over the past decade. What parents normally probably don't hear is that the study that launched the Autism scare has been debunked thoroughly in the last couple years. The study that launched the scare has actually in a rare move by a British medical journal has been yanked out of the journal, because it was so flawed.
- Absolutely you should vaccinate your child. I think that vaccines have changed the face of medicine, and protected countless individuals from terrible disease. I don't think that vaccines deserve the bad rap that they have gotten. I think that we are seeing more and more today that those associations that we thought were real aren't. That said, vaccines don't have to be delivered in the manner that the AAP, CDC, and WHO recommend. Those groups are very motivated to try to protect everyone, and so you potentially have children out there who you may see at two months of age, and may not see again for many months. And yes, then the right thing to do at that visit is to give them as many shots as you can to protect them from everything that you can, but in most communities, parents are quite reliable and you're not lost a follow up, and so in my practice, we give one shot per visit. We prioritize the vaccines that the most fragile children need, and what they are most susceptible to. We procrastinate the vaccines that frankly I don't care if you get until later. I just want you to get it some point, as long as you are not traveling to an endemic area, and in so doing, we give one shot per visit. I think it's more important to consider the psychological implications of giving multiple shots at a visit, than to worry about the actual safety of the vaccine itself. Vaccines have been shown to be very safe, and protect from disease but, I won't give more than one shot per visit, because I don't ever want to have to hold a child down for a second shot. That's just not fair to the child.