By CASEY NEILL
IMMUNISATION rates across Greater Dandenong have increased by as much as 23 per cent in the past two years.
But the council’s regulatory services manager Peter Shelton says there’s room for improvement and plans to make it happen.
“These programs protect children against many different diseases such as whooping cough, chicken pox and other viruses that can cause cancers,” he said.
“Immunisation of these children also helps to reduce the spread of these diseases and, in some cases, can lead to almost total eradication of particular diseases within a community.”
Mr Shelton said maintaining immunisation rates was more challenging for Greater Dandenong than many other municipalities because of the culturally and linguistically diverse community.
He said the council needed to help newly-arrived families understand the immunisation process, educate them about its importance, and communicate effectively with parents to gain consent for immunisation and an understanding of immunisations already received.
“These difficulties were reflected in immunisation rates, which in the period 2010 to 2012 were consistently lower than the regional average,” he said.
“The council’s immunisation team recognised this problem in 2011 and commenced some analysis to try and further clarify the reasons.”
Mr Shelton said the team introduced initiatives aimed at improving rates, including forming stronger working relationships with local schools where most of the immunisation program was delivered.
“These efforts met with success, with immunisation rates across the various programs increasing between four and 23 per cent by the end of 2013,” he said.
The team also successfully sought Department of Health funding to conduct more formal and detailed analysis, “with a particular focus on secondary age students, where the biggest problems seemed to exist”.
The project was completed in January.
“Findings of the analysis will be used to inform further work on improving immunisation rates over the coming years,” Mr Shelton said.
“One of the key messages from the analysis is that there is a need to improve community understanding of the importance of secondary age children participating in immunisation programs.”
During Immunisation Week, 21 to 27 April, everyone is encouraged to check their vaccinations.
Take the Better Health Channel online quiz at www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/immunisation.
