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Community-centered education improves vaccination rates in children from low-income households

Suryadevara, Manika; Bonville, Cynthia A; Ferraioli, Frank; Domachowske, Joseph B
OBJECTIVE:We partnered with the Salvation Army to educate resource-poor families regarding childhood immunizations in an effort to improve vaccine coverage rates. METHODS:Eligibility for enrollment included children of families presenting at registration for our Salvation Army holiday gift program, available to families with an annual income <150% of federal poverty guidelines. Parents completed a questionnaire, were provided each child's vaccination status as documented in the New York State Immunization Information System, and interacted with the study team to address immunization-related concerns. Missed vaccines were identified and parents were directed to their child's medical home for necessary immunizations. Vaccine coverage was ascertained via the New York State Immunization Information System every 6 to 8 weeks with telephone follow-up for children who remained delayed. The McNemar test and standard 2-proportion comparison were used to determine confidence intervals when analyzing matched or independent data, respectively. RESULTS:A total of 1531 children were enrolled; 416 (28%) of the 1477 children with accurate immunization records were vaccine complete. When we excluded influenza vaccine, 1034 (70%) of children had received all other recommended vaccines. Nine months later, vaccine completion rates increased from 28% to 45%, largely because of improvements in influenza vaccination rates, which increased by 17% (confidence interval [CI] 15.5-19.5), a significant improvement over county (8%, 95% CI 7.4-8.1) and statewide (5%, 95% CI 4.7-4.8) rates during the same period. CONCLUSIONS:Immunization rates in poor children are suboptimal. Partnering with community-based organizations to address parental concerns, provide education, and perform follow-up was effective in improving immunization rates, particularly for influenza vaccine.
PMID: 23837177
ISSN: 1098-4275
CID: 4551342

Stress-dependent changes in neuroinflammatory markers observed after common laboratory stressors are not seen following acute social defeat of the Sprague Dawley rat

Hueston, Cara M; Barnum, Christopher J; Eberle, Jaime A; Ferraioli, Frank J; Buck, Hollin M; Deak, Terrence
Exposure to acute stress has been shown to increase the expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines in brain, blood and peripheral organs. However, the nature of the inflammatory response evoked by acute stress varies depending on the stressor used and species examined. The goal of the following series of studies was to characterize the consequences of social defeat in the Sprague Dawley (SD) rat using three different social defeat paradigms. In Experiments 1 and 2, adult male SD rats were exposed to a typical acute resident-intruder paradigm of social defeat (60 min) by placement into the home cage of a larger, aggressive Long Evans rat and brain tissue was collected at multiple time points for analysis of IL-1β protein and gene expression changes in the PVN, BNST and adrenal glands. In subsequent experiments, rats were exposed to once daily social defeat for 7 or 21 days (Experiment 3) or housed continuously with an aggressive partner (separated by a partition) for 7 days (Experiment 4) to assess the impact of chronic social stress on inflammatory measures. Despite the fact that social defeat produced a comparable corticosterone response as other stressors (restraint, forced swim and footshock; Experiment 5), acute social defeat did not affect inflammatory measures. A small but reliable increase in IL-1 gene expression was observed immediately after the 7th exposure to social defeat, while other inflammatory measures were unaffected. In contrast, restraint, forced swim and footshock all significantly increased IL-1 gene expression in the PVN; other inflammatory factors (IL-6, cox-2) were unaffected in this structure. These findings provide a comprehensive evaluation of stress-dependent inflammatory changes in the SD rat, raising intriguing questions regarding the features of the stress challenge that may be predictive of stress-dependent neuroinflammation.
PMID: 21406198
ISSN: 1873-507x
CID: 4551332