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| Guide to Immunizations |
Fully immunizing your child according to the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics can help protect your child from many common infections. These infections can lead to serious and even life threatening complications. Although the vaccines may have mild side effects and more rarely, serious complications, in general, it is safer to immunize your children than allow them to get any of the infections that they prevent.
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| Are your children's immunizations up to date? Use our Vaccine Schedule program to print a customized immunization schedule for your child. |
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For more information on vaccinations, ask your doctor for individual vaccine information sheets, or download them yourself at pediatrics.about.com.
Immunizations Internet Resources:
- Immunizations: links to sites with the current immunization schedule and information on individual vaccines.
- Immunization Quiz: Take this Immunization Quiz to see if you know as much about the vaccines your kids get as you should.
- 10 Things you need to know about immunizations: from the CDC National Immunization Program, an article that talks about ten facts about vaccines that all parents should know.
- Vaccine Side Effects: from the CDC National Immunization Program, an article that states 'Vaccine side effects are uncommon, and when they do occur, most are mild, such as soreness at the vaccination site or fever for a couple of days. The following documents provide you with specific facts about known side effects and summarizes current information about proven and unproven relationships about vaccine side effects. This information is provided to dispel rumors and help people make informed decisions regarding vaccination.' Includes links to info on the unproven links between vaccines and autism.
- Vaccine Information Statements (VIS): from the CDC National Immunization Program, a list of the vaccine information sheets that you should receive from your Pediatrician before your child is vaccinated. Includes info on dosages, side effects, contraindications, etc.
- Photos of children suffering from illnesses that could be prevented by vaccines: graphic photos of children with vaccine preventable illnesses from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Other Immunization Links:
- Immunization Action Coalition: the premier source of childhood, adolescent, and adult immunization information and hepatitis B educational materials. And it's all free.
- CDC Travel Information: detailed information on travel health recommendations from the Center for Disease Control, including a graphical travel map with immunization requirements for travel to different parts of the world.
- Every Child by Two: web site with mission to protect all children from vaccine preventable diseases by raising parental awareness of the critical need for timely infant immunizations, fostering the establishment of a systematic method to locate and immunize children, and providing convenient access to immunization services into the future.
- National Immunization Program: home page of the CDC NIP. Communicates the risks and benefits of vaccines and discusses what would happen if we stopped immunizing our children.
- The Vaccine Page: provides access to up-to-the-minute news about vaccines and an annotated database of vaccine resources on the Internet.
- Vaccine Safety Fact Sheets: The following factsheets have been written to help people understand the facts about immunity, vaccines, and the diseases that can be prevented by vaccines.
- VAERS: The Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System is a Cooperative Program for Vaccine Safety of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). VAERS is a post-marketing safety surveillance program, collecting information about adverse events (side effects) that occur after the administration of US licensed vaccines. Reports are welcome from all concerned individuals: patients, parents, health care providers, pharmacists, and vaccine manufacturers.
- World Health Organization: information on communicable and infectious diseases, tropical illnesses and vaccine preventable diseases.
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