ABSTRACT
Introduction: Vaccines are one of most successful healthinterventions that bring about significant reduction ininfectious diseases and adverse health consequences. In India,The Expanded Program on Immunization (EPI) was launchedin 1978 and it was re-designated as the Universal Immunizationprogram (UIP) in 1985, with a goal to cover at least 85% ofinfants. In India 7.4 million children are not immunized. Studyaimed to determine the knowledge, attitude and practice ofmothers with under five children about immunization.Material and methods: Research was conducted to determinethe knowledge attitude and practice of mothers with underfive children about immunization. A cross sectional study wasconducted among mothers having children aged more thantwo and half years in the field practice area of K.S. HegdeMedical Academy. Data was collected using a pre-tested semistructured questionnaire from 348 mothers during a periodof two months. Among the study participants (92) 26% werefrom urban area and (256) 74% were from rural area. Motherswere the main decision makers regarding vaccination of thechild in both urban and rural areas.Results: Majority 99% supported vaccination. Majority 97%of the mothers in both the urban and rural areas believedthat vaccines were protective. In the study it was seen that93% of the mothers had vaccinated their children as pervaccination card and the rest of the mothers were not upto date with vaccinating their children. Only 43%of themothers were aware of the side effects and 32% knew aboutcontraindications. In this study it was found that 32% of themothers believed that vaccination could be done even if thechild had fever. Only 22% of the mothers were aware of theSMS notification program by the government.Conclusion: In the study the reasons stated by the mothersfor not fully vaccinating the child were because of the sideeffects 44%, difficulty in reaching the center 28% and longcrowds 19%.According to our study, majority of the motherswere supportive of immunizing their children but unaware oftheir contraindications and side effects.