RESUMO
To assess 1] how aware those who administer vaccines in the primary health care centres [PHCs] are of the appropriate precautions and contraindicaitons of vaccines and 2] the extent to which their practice complies with standards, and 3] the correlation between the levels of knowledge and practice on one hand with the duration of practice and attendance at a training course on vaccination on the other hand, for physicians and nurses separately. A self-adminstered questionnaire including 16 statements related to knowledge and practice of precautions and contraindications of vaccines was distributed among workers in 50 MOH PHCs in Riyadh. 506 questionnaires were returned, only 331 were completed for this part of the study giving a response rate of almost 65%. However, the statement-specific response rate varied. Except for a few, most statements were correctly responded to by a majority of the respondents reflecting adequate knowledge and appropriate practice. Experience in dealing with vaccination, and formal training in vaccination were not statistically significantly associated with the responses of both physicians and nurses. Inspite of the limitations of this study it could be fairly concluded that the overall knowledge and practices regarding precautions and contraindications of childhood immunizations among the primary care providers surveyed was good. Significant gaps still exist. This underlines the need for continuous training and supervision of health care providers who deal with the immunization of children