With the start of the school year just around the corner, it is easy to overlook one of the most important things on any back-to-school checklist — making sure your child is vaccinated. Vaccinations protect children from serious diseases, ultimately protecting families, schools and communities by way of safe and effective immunizations. Whether your child… Continue reading Vaccines: The Must-Haves on Your Child’s Back-to-School Checklist
Tag: vaccinations
Vaccines to Get if You’re Over 50
Do you think that immunizations are strictly kid stuff? Think again: While you likely got plenty of “shots” as a child, you need more after age 50. Advancing age can render you more susceptible to certain illnesses, making it necessary to get inoculated against them. In other cases, the immunity gained from a long-ago vaccine… Continue reading Vaccines to Get if You’re Over 50
Reminding People about Vaccinations Can Increase Rates of Immunization
An updated Cochrane Review, published in the Cochrane Library on January 18th 2018, suggests that reminding people when their vaccinations are due or overdue increases the number of people being immunized. A release from the publisher notes that rates of immunization against infectious diseases in children and adults are improving, but under-vaccination remains a problem… Continue reading Reminding People about Vaccinations Can Increase Rates of Immunization
A New Approach to Giving Penicillins
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) investigators have developed two approaches to increasing the use of penicillins and cephalosporins – highly effective antibiotics that are not as problematic as many alternatives – in hospitalized patients previously believed to be allergic to penicillin. Their report, which has been published online in the… Continue reading A New Approach to Giving Penicillins
“Health Risk Assessment” Questionnaire Benefits Non-Disabled Elderly
Implementation of a collaborative care model among community-dwelling older people using a health risk assessment instrument resulted in better health behaviors and increased use of preventative care, according to a study published in October 2015 in PLOS Medicine. The trial, conducted by Andreas Stuck from the University Hospital Bern and University of Bern, Switzerland, and… Continue reading “Health Risk Assessment” Questionnaire Benefits Non-Disabled Elderly
Senior Vaccination Rates Are Too Low
While influenza, pneumococcal, tetanus, and shingles vaccines are effective, routinely recommended for older adults and covered in varying degrees by health insurance, vaccination rates among older adults are much lower than current targets set by the U.S. government’s Healthy People 2020 Initiative. The undesirable rates of vaccines have far-reaching results: Older Americans are much more… Continue reading Senior Vaccination Rates Are Too Low