Nevada sees boost in child vaccinations

Tuesday, May 13, 2003 | 9:35 a.m.

One area of children's health where the state has shown sharp improvement is in vaccinations of those 19 to 35 months old.

The downside, according to the latest survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is that Nevada still lags behind national averages in most vaccination categories.

In a survey based on 2001 statistics, Nevada ranked 48th in the percentage of children who had at least four doses of diphtheria and tetanus toxoids, three doses of oral poliovirus vaccine, three doses of Haemophilus influenza type b vaccine and one dose of a measles-mumps-rubella vaccine.

But preliminary results of a newer CDC survey covering a yearlong period through June 30 revealed that Nevada jumped to 33rd.

Nevada went from 72.2 percent immunized to 75.9 percent, but that was still under the national average of 76.7 percent. The state also has a long way to go in related immunization categories: Nevada ranked last with 90.2 percent of its children having at least three diphtheria vaccines, compared with a national average of 93.9 percent. Nevada topped the national average in only two of 11 vaccination categories.

But Fran Courtney, director of clinic and nursing services for the Clark County Health District, said much of Nevada's improvement in many of those categories -- the state was within 3 percent of the national average in nine categories -- is attributable to the Health District's efforts last year to locate children who hadn't been adequately immunized. District volunteers even called parents during weekends to get them to bring their children in for shots.

"It was that fourth dose of diphtheria that kids weren't coming in to get," Courtney said. "Until the end of 2001 we hadn't targeted that age group. We spent more time concentrating on immunizations for kids under age 1."

Part of the problem was that many parents had forgotten to have their children complete their immunizations, she said.

"You don't have many kids having measles or mumps so it becomes less of a priority for parents to have their children get those vaccines," Courtney said.

To get more children vaccinated, the county and state are working on an immunization registry that will enable health officials to better track and target children who have not been adequately immunized. Robert Salcido, state immunization program manager, said he expects the registry to become operational statewide within six months.

"If we knew for sure what it would take to increase immunizations for children, we would do it," Salcido said. "What may work somewhere else may not work in Nevada. I'd like to say that we're showing improvement because of all of our hard work."