Longitudinal association between parents' reported vaccination program preferences and children's actual immunization patterns in Shanghai, China.

Publisher: BioMed Central Country of Publication: England NLM ID: 100968562 Publication Model: Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1471-2458 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 14712458 NLM ISO Abbreviation: BMC Public Health Subsets: MEDLINE

Original Publication: London : BioMed Central, [2001-

Parents*/psychology ; Immunization Programs*/statistics & numerical data; Humans ; China ; Male ; Female ; Prospective Studies ; Infant ; Adult ; Vaccination/statistics & numerical data ; Vaccination/psychology ; Longitudinal Studies ; Surveys and Questionnaires

Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: The study protocol was reviewed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and approved by the University of Michigan Health Sciences and Behavioral Sciences Institutional Review Board (#HUM00125379) and an ethical review committee from the Shanghai Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (#2017–2). Participants gave written informed consistent prior to data collection. Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Background: As China expands its national immunization program, it is essential to understand parents' beliefs about pediatric vaccination programs and the translation into actual vaccination decision-making for their children. This study aims to characterize parents pediatric vaccination program preferences and assess the association between parents' reported vaccination preferences and their children's vaccination status.
Methods: In a prospective cohort study in Shanghai, China, we linked parents' survey responses about their preferences for pediatric vaccine programs when the child was ≤ 3 months in 2017 to their children's immunization records in 2020. We classified parents by their vaccination program preferences through a latent class analysis (LCA). Logistic regression analysis was used to explore the association between immunization patterns and respondents' LCA results.
Results: The 469 parents were split into four classes: governmental clinic advocates (20%), careful deciders (45%), convenience-focused (19%), and prefer less co-administration (16%). Among the children 66% received combination vaccines, 91% had received at least one imported vaccine, and the average number of office visits by the age of six months was 7.
Conclusions: There were no associations between parents' reported preference categories and children's vaccination patterns. The high acceptance of combination vaccines and tolerance of co-administration gives parents choices for vaccination and impart increased confidence in including new vaccines in the vaccination program.
(© 2025. The Author(s).)

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K01AI137123 National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; K01AI137123 National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

Keywords: Attitudes; China; Health knowledge; Immunization programs; Parental attitudes; Pediatrics; Practice; Vaccination; Vaccine hesitancy

Date Created: 20250314 Date Completed: 20250314 Latest Revision: 20250318

20250318

PMC11907872

10.1186/s12889-025-22253-x

40082853