Prevalence and factors associated with missed opportunity for immunization in children attending paediatric outpatient clinic at Juba Teaching Hospital

Abstract

Introduction: Immunization is one of the most effective public health interventions; it reduces morbidity and mortality from vaccines preventable diseases. Objectives: To determine the prevalence and factors associated with missed opportunity for immunization in children aged 0-23 months attending paediatric outpatient clinic at Juba Teaching Hospital, South Sudan. Methodology: The study was a hospital-based cross-sectional study conducted between May and June 2012 at Juba Teaching Hospital. The standard World Health Organization, Expanded Programme on Immunization (WHO EPI) protocol for assessing missed opportunity for immuni-zation was used to conduct this study. It involved client exit interviews and reviews of immuni-zation cards plus parental recall for those who met the inclusion criteria and those whose par-ents/guardian gave consent was sampled. Eighteen health workers from different paediatric wards and EPI department were interviewed. Results: A total of 448 children were included in the study and18 health workers were interviewed. Overall prevalence of missed opportunity for immunization in the study was (56.5%). Missed op-portunity for immunization was more common for OPV 3 (24.4%), DPT 3 (22.1%) and measles (31.2%) compared to other vaccines. The reasons for this rate were failure to attend antenatal care and home delivery. Lack of information was sited as the reason for missing immunization by the parents/guardians. Conclusion and recommendations: The high prevalence of missed opportunity for immunization at Juba Teaching Hospital can be reduced by strengthening of immunization services through care-taker’s health awareness on the important of immunization and defaulter tracing.