ImmunizationPolicy

The physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistant and staff at MD Pediatric Associates have always endeavored to be good partners with our patients and families. We strive to provide information to help parents make the right decisions for each child’s health. As your child’s medical home, we bring our medical expertise and you bring knowledge of your child and your daily experience to these healthcare decisions. We recommend fully immunizing children, based upon the most current and complete scientific data available which supports the development of immunizations as one of the most significant medical advancements of the 20th and 21st centuries. Today, thanks to the development and widespread use of vaccines, the frequency of vaccine-preventable illnesses has been vastly reduced, and in some cases nearly eliminated. As a result the occurrence of debilitating side-effects or death from illnesses such as meningitis has been greatly reduced in children over the past thirty years. Unfortunately, many parents may be confused about the value and safety of vaccines due to misinformation. If you have any questions or concerns about vaccine safety, please discuss your concerns with your child’s healthcare provider.

Children who are unimmunized may pose a significant risk to some of the most vulnerable patients in our practice including newborns, children who are immune-compromised due to cancer or other chronic illness, pregnant mothers or elderly relatives. We do not want to place these vulnerable populations at risk of contracting vaccine-preventable illnesses. Therefore, we will no longer accept any new patients to our practice who choose not to vaccinate. Our primary concern is the health of all of our patients and their families.

We encourage our current families with unvaccinated children to talk about immunization concerns with your provider and to begin the catch-up schedule for any required but missing vaccinations. Families who do not agree to schedule this catch-up immunization process  will be asked to transfer to another healthcare practice or will not be accepted as new patients. We will continue to provide healthcare to those children with medical conditions that preclude vaccinations such as documented allergic reactions or certain neurologic/neuromuscular disorders. If your child is currently on an altered vaccination schedule, we will continue as your healthcare provider with your signed consent that you intend to complete primary vaccines by age 2 and full school-aged immunizations by 5 years, whether or not your child attends public school.

We understand that our policy will not be acceptable to some families. We hope that all our families will consider immunization to be an appropriate choice for their children, but should your family decline to immunize, there will be no fees for a transfer of your child’s records to a new medical home.

You will find our  pediatric immunization schedule here.