How Vaccines Help Children With Healthier Living

Children in the U.S. can still get sick, become disabled or even die because of vaccine-preventable diseases. One way to help protect yourself and your family is by keeping your children up-to-date on recommended vaccines.

With so much information – correct and incorrect – circulating about vaccine safety, it’s important to go to talk with your child’s doctor about any concerns you have about their immunizations. Franciscan Physician Network pediatricians answer common questions about vaccines and explain the importance of routine vaccines for keeping your children, and your entire family, healthier.

What Do Vaccines Do?

A vaccine is made from very small amounts of weak or dead germs that can cause diseases - for example, viruses, bacteria or toxins. A vaccine prepares your body to fight the disease faster and more effectively, reducing the likelihood that you will get sick.

Vaccines help prevent more than 20 life-threatening diseases, allowing people of all ages live longer, healthier lives. Immunization currently prevents 2-3 million deaths every year from diseases like diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, influenza and measles.

“Vaccines are an important part of preventative medicine,” said Daina Roberson, MD, pediatrician with Franciscan Physician Network Dyer. “When you get a vaccine, your body builds an immune response against a specific disease. So whatever vaccine you're given, your body is going to recognize that as a disease, as something foreign, and it's going to make antibodies that will recognize the disease if tries to affect you later on.”

If My Child Is Healthy, Why Do They Need Vaccines?

Vaccines are key to preventing disease. Vaccines benefit both the people who get them and the vulnerable, unvaccinated people around them. That's because the infection can no longer spread through the community if most people are immunized. To offer the widest protection against a certain disease such as measles or diphtheria, at least 90% of children should be vaccinated. If 9 in 10 children are vaccinated, the disease cannot spread far even if someone not vaccinated gets it. This is sometimes called "community" or "herd" immunity. This means unvaccinated people are protected by the great number of others immune to the illness.

“We want to give vaccines in order to prevent you from ever developing some of these diseases that could be deadly or even some that have just been eradicated, over the course of time,” Dr. Roberson said. “It's all about prevention.”

Plus, vaccines reduce the number of deaths and disability from infections like measles, whooping cough and chickenpox.

Should Some Children Not Get Vaccines?

“Generally speaking, most people can get all vaccines, but there are some cases where we need to use a little discretion and discuss it further with your physician,” Dr. Roberson said. “Most vaccines are safe for everyone, but of course, there are some cases where you shouldn't get certain vaccines.”

Medical reasons to avoid certain vaccinations for your child may include:

• Your child is severely immunocompromised.
• Your child is getting chemotherapy.
• Your child has had a severe allergic reaction anaphylactic reaction to a previous vaccine.

The CDC maintains a list of vaccines and their contraindications and precautions on its website. Talk with your physician about any concerns you have.

Can My Child Get Sick From A Vaccine?

A vaccine is made from very small amounts of weak or dead germs that can cause diseases - for example, viruses, bacteria or toxins. A vaccine prepares your body to fight the disease faster and more effectively, reducing the likelihood that you will get sick.

“It depends on the type of vaccine,” Dr. Roberson said. “It's impossible to get the disease from a vaccine that's been made with a dead or killed virus or bacteria, or even just part of the bacteria or virus. There are only a couple common vaccines that are made from weakened or attenuated viruses.”

Dr. Roberson explained that chickenpox, MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) and influenza are some of the common virus-related vaccines.

“Those vaccines could possibly give you a mild form of the disease if you get vaccinated with them,” she said. “For example, if you get the chickenpox vaccine, it’s possible that you may get symptoms such as a rash.”

Dr. Roberson said any illness you get from a vaccine is significantly less severe than getting the disease itself. The risk of illness from vaccination is very small, and there are only a few live virus vaccines that could potentially cause symptoms.

Should I Be Worried About Reactions To Vaccines?

Vaccines may cause effects like a sore arm or low-grade fever. Serious reactions are rare. But they can happen. Your child's healthcare provider or nurse may discuss these with you before giving the shots.

The risks for getting the diseases the shots protect against are higher than the risks for having a reaction to the vaccine.

Caring for mild reactions to vaccines

You can help ease these mild reactions in children:

• Fussiness. Children may need extra love and care after getting immunized. The shots that keep them from getting serious diseases can also cause discomfort for a while. Children may experience fussiness, fever, and pain at the injection site, after they have been immunized.
• Fever. Do not give aspirin. You may want to give your child acetaminophen or ibuprofen to reduce pain and fever, as directed by your child's healthcare provider. Also:
• Give your child plenty to drink.
• Clothe your child lightly. Do not cover or wrap your child tightly.
• Sponge your child in a few inches of lukewarm (not cold) bath water.
• Swelling or pain. Do not give aspirin. You may want to give your child acetaminophen to reduce pain and fever, as directed by your child's healthcare provider. Apply a clean, cool washcloth over the sore area as needed for comfort.

When Do My Children Need Vaccinations?

Most of your child’s vaccines are completed between birth and age 6. Many vaccines are given more than once, at different ages, and in combinations. This means that you’ll need to keep a careful record of your child's shots if you receive vaccines from multiple places, such as if you’ve moved states or switched doctors.

Ask your child's healthcare provider for an immunization record form. Think about your child's record as you would a birth certificate. Keep it with your other essential documents.

Most parents and healthcare providers do a good job of keeping up with immunizations. Yet studies show that about one-fourth of preschool children are missing at least one routine vaccine. Most states will not let your child start school without a complete vaccine record. Sometimes a vaccine is missed when a child is sick. No matter what the reason, it’s important to make up missed immunizations.

If your child has missed an immunization, you don't have to go back and start over for most vaccines. The previous vaccines are still good. Your healthcare provider will just resume the vaccine schedule.

“Most of the shots that kids get, they get in the first about two years of life, so that's why if you have a child you know you have to keep coming back every couple of months for more visits,” said Corin Marshall, MD, pediatrician at Franciscan Physician Network Heartland Crossing Pediatrics in Mooresville.. “That's so we can monitor their growth and development, but also so that they can get shots.”

Annual vaccinations

Flu vaccines, which are based on the virus strains predicted to be in highest circulation, are recommended each fall. The vaccine, recommended for children 6 months old or older, is updated to protect against whichever flu strains are thought to be most prevalent each year. That means your child should get an annual flu shot around October or November. That's the beginning of flu season, when the illness will usually start circulating around your child's school. But don't wait until school age to protect your child with a flu shot.

Like the flu vaccine, the covid vaccine is currently recommended yearly for people over 6 months of age by the CDC.

School immunizations

Your early years of parenting were likely filled with visits to the pediatrician for checkups, and for vaccinations to guard your children against serious diseases. You may have even thought those days would be over once you sent your kids to kindergarten. But that's not so - school-age kids need vaccinations, too.

Doctors can only give certain vaccinations to older children while other vaccines need updating, since most vaccinations only offer protection for a limited time.

“By the time your child gets to kindergarten, they will have been vaccinated against a whole list of diseases, like hepatitis A and B; diptheria; tetanus; pertussis; H. flu, which is not the flu virus, it's a different kind of bacteria. Also, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, chicken pox, lots of things,” Dr. Marshall said. “But after you get to kindergarten, you don't get shots again, other than flu shots, until sixth grade.”

For current state school immunization requirements, visit the Indiana State Department of Health website or the Illinois Department of Health website.

Common vaccines for school-age kids include:

• Varicella (chickenpox)
• MMR
• Tetanus shot
• Pneumonia
• Hepatitis B
• Rotavirus

“There are quite a few vaccines that we give for school-aged children,” Dr. Roberson said. “When you come in for those well-child visits, we try to get you caught up on any vaccines that may be due or missing. Since there is a long list of them, there are a lot of combination vaccines as well.”

Dr. Roberson explained that these combination vaccines can prevent a child from being poked with needles too many times and prioritize their comfort.

Vaccinations for tweens and teens

Vaccinations are not just for younger children, tweens and teens need to stay updated on their vaccinations as well.

According to the CDC, at 11 to 12 years old, your preteen should receive vaccines to protect them from the following diseases:

• Meningococcal disease (MenACWY) (one dose)
• HPV (two doses)
• Tetanus, diphtheria, and whooping cough (pertussis) (Tdap) (one dose)
• Influenza (Flu) (every year)

From the ages of 13-18 years old, your child should receive:

• Influenza (Flu) (every year)
• Meningococcal disease
• Meningococcal conjugate (MenACWY) given at 16 years old (2nd dose)
• Serogroup B meningococcal (MenB) may be given, preferably at 16 through 18 years (2 doses)

Be sure to speak with your child's primary care physician about their immunization schedule, discuss any concerns about vaccinations, track your child's vaccinations and keep them up to date. Your actions could help save lives.

What Happens If My Child Isn’t Vaccinated At An Early Age?

“Most of the vaccines are ones that you can catch up on later down the line,” Dr. Marshall said. “If you are thinking, ‘Oh, goodness, I totally forgot to get these vaccines and now the school's requiring them,’ we have adjusted schedules where we can catch your child up.”
“There are a couple vaccines, that once you age out of them you can't go back and get them anymore, so that's why it's important to always be coming in to all those visits before age two,” Dr. Marshall said. “But most of them you can catch up later.”

How Can We Be Prepared When My Child Has A Vaccine?

With vaccines, you can expect to have a bit of discomfort whether it’s from needles poking the skin or even related symptoms depending on the received vaccination. It’s important to be prepared before, during and after you get a vaccine.

“With any vaccine, you're going to get some pain and maybe some redness, even sometimes some swelling right at the injection site,” Dr. Roberson said. “You can take over the counter pain medication, whether that's Tylenol or ibuprofen, and apply some ice to the area. Still, we ask that you do that after you get the vaccine.”

Dr. Roberson explained that there are some studies that show taking Tylenol or ibuprofen before you get a vaccine could potentially lessen the effects of the vaccine.

“We generally ask that you give the kids some Tylenol as soon as you get home, but try not to do too many things before you come into the office,” Dr. Roberson said. “Icing the area is fine, otherwise, it's more about preparing yourself for that initial poke and the pain that comes from it.”

Vaccinations Save Lives

Vaccinations are important for several different reasons including

• To avoid diseases from coming back
• To prevent diseases from traveling (because we travel)
• To help protect infants, those who are not able to be vaccinated for a certain illness due to age, or people living with other medical conditions.

Be sure to speak with your child's primary care physician about their immunization schedule, discuss any concerns about vaccinations, track your child's vaccinations and keep them up to date.

Don't forget to share this information with other parents. Your actions could help save lives.