Cargando…

A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia

(1) Background: Immunisation is a crucial and effective method for preventing infectious diseases, with its success dependent on high immunisation rates to protect under-immunised individuals and promote herd immunity. This qualitative descriptive study is part of a larger explanatory sequential mix...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Alabadi, Marwa, Pitt, Victoria, Aldawood, Zakariya
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10536341/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37766077
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/vaccines11091400
_version_ 1785112842931798016
author Alabadi, Marwa
Pitt, Victoria
Aldawood, Zakariya
author_facet Alabadi, Marwa
Pitt, Victoria
Aldawood, Zakariya
author_sort Alabadi, Marwa
collection PubMed
description (1) Background: Immunisation is a crucial and effective method for preventing infectious diseases, with its success dependent on high immunisation rates to protect under-immunised individuals and promote herd immunity. This qualitative descriptive study is part of a larger explanatory sequential mixed method design that aims to explore factors influencing parents’ decision making to complete childhood immunisation in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, a country experiencing disparities in immunisation coverage across its population. (2) Methods: The sample consisted of a subset of participants from the initial quantitative phase, which included a survey on the immunisation attitudes of parents living in Qatif. This initial phase included n = 350 participants, who were over 18, had access to one of the 27 Primary Health Care (PHC) Centres in Qatif, and had a child under 24 months. This paper presents the qualitative–descriptive phase, which used a qualitative survey to gain open-ended responses from parents (n = 20) and analysed using thematic analysis. (3) Results: Participants identified certain vaccines, particularly MMR, as influencing their immunisation practices. Specific factors identified as deterring parents from immunising their children included fear of autism and other developmental delays, concerns about risks and side effects, mistrust in vaccine efficacy, and discouraging information from the media. Parents’ immunisation decisions were evidently affected by policy compliance, family and friends, and social networking sites. These factors are explained through the socio-ecological model. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic influenced parents’ decisions on vaccine completion in terms of perceived barriers, perceived benefits, and perceived trust. (4) Conclusions: By examining the social–ecological factors shaping parents’ decisions to immunise their children in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, this research contributes to the literature and informs the Saudi National Childhood Immunisation Programme about factors contributing to childhood immunisation hesitancy, helping to address a critical healthcare issue.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-10536341
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2023
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-105363412023-09-29 A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia Alabadi, Marwa Pitt, Victoria Aldawood, Zakariya Vaccines (Basel) Article (1) Background: Immunisation is a crucial and effective method for preventing infectious diseases, with its success dependent on high immunisation rates to protect under-immunised individuals and promote herd immunity. This qualitative descriptive study is part of a larger explanatory sequential mixed method design that aims to explore factors influencing parents’ decision making to complete childhood immunisation in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, a country experiencing disparities in immunisation coverage across its population. (2) Methods: The sample consisted of a subset of participants from the initial quantitative phase, which included a survey on the immunisation attitudes of parents living in Qatif. This initial phase included n = 350 participants, who were over 18, had access to one of the 27 Primary Health Care (PHC) Centres in Qatif, and had a child under 24 months. This paper presents the qualitative–descriptive phase, which used a qualitative survey to gain open-ended responses from parents (n = 20) and analysed using thematic analysis. (3) Results: Participants identified certain vaccines, particularly MMR, as influencing their immunisation practices. Specific factors identified as deterring parents from immunising their children included fear of autism and other developmental delays, concerns about risks and side effects, mistrust in vaccine efficacy, and discouraging information from the media. Parents’ immunisation decisions were evidently affected by policy compliance, family and friends, and social networking sites. These factors are explained through the socio-ecological model. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic influenced parents’ decisions on vaccine completion in terms of perceived barriers, perceived benefits, and perceived trust. (4) Conclusions: By examining the social–ecological factors shaping parents’ decisions to immunise their children in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, this research contributes to the literature and informs the Saudi National Childhood Immunisation Programme about factors contributing to childhood immunisation hesitancy, helping to address a critical healthcare issue. MDPI 2023-08-22 /pmc/articles/PMC10536341/ /pubmed/37766077 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/vaccines11091400 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Alabadi, Marwa
Pitt, Victoria
Aldawood, Zakariya
A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title_full A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title_fullStr A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title_full_unstemmed A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title_short A Qualitative Analysis of Social-Ecological Factors Shaping Childhood Immunisation Hesitancy and Delay in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia
title_sort qualitative analysis of social-ecological factors shaping childhood immunisation hesitancy and delay in the eastern province of saudi arabia
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10536341/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37766077
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/vaccines11091400
work_keys_str_mv AT alabadimarwa aqualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia
AT pittvictoria aqualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia
AT aldawoodzakariya aqualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia
AT alabadimarwa qualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia
AT pittvictoria qualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia
AT aldawoodzakariya qualitativeanalysisofsocialecologicalfactorsshapingchildhoodimmunisationhesitancyanddelayintheeasternprovinceofsaudiarabia