Can you have the (non MMR) 12 and 13 month innoculations together? Aimed at those that are cautious regarding innoculations

[stressed2007]

My son has missed these injections as he did not go to GP for MMR (we are having seperates)- he is now 16 months. He has therefore not had:

Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib) and meningitis C (Hib/MenC) - one jab or

Pneumococcal infection
(Pneumococcal conjugate vaccine, PCV)

I believe these are boosters. Can anyone please confirm? Is it too late for him to have these/will these still be effective? Can he have these on the same day? More importantly should he have these on same day or should he have these spaced and if so how spaced? Finally are these very necessary (obviously Men c is not good). If they are important and if they have only been recently introduced why are they not giving them to older children - I don't think my 3 year old had these when she was this age. Did they not use to give these boosters?

Many thanks

[thumbwitch]

Hib/Men C and PCV are boosters. It doesn't matter that you are late with them, my DS has just had his Hib/MenC at 17.5mo cos we fell off the vaccine register for some obscure reason . But it does matter that you have them as the effectiveness of the early shots wears off after about 1 year - this has only fairly recently been realised.

My DS had a reaction to the PCV before so the practice nurse said that he should wait for at least a month after the Hib/Men C before having the PCV (I am not keen on him having it at all tbh) and definitely NOT have it with the MMR or any other monovalent version of it.

Your practice nurse should be able to advise you about how much spacing there should be between them but as a rough guide I would say have them a month apart.

HTH.

[stressed2007]

Unfortunately my nurse knows very little - seriously - you would be amazed at what she does n't know about innoculations.

Did you mean a month between having both Hib/Men C and PVC and a MMR single or between Hib/Men C and the PVC? Thanks

[thumbwitch]

A month between the Hib/menC and the PCV; and then another month for the monovalent measles or whatever you're having first.

That's a shame about your nurse - the one at my practice is very knowledgeable so I assumed (obviously wrongly) that they have to read up on this sort of thing.

[angel1976]

My DS had all three all at once!

I saw in the red book that the boosters were meant to be given at 12 months and then the MMR at 13 months so went in with DS last Monday expecting 2 jabs and got 3 instead! Think I was more traumatised than he was... Luckily that was 8 days ago and other than there being a small knot in his thigh where one of them had gone in (and getting smaller, it was huge to begin with!), he doesn't seemed to have suffer any adverse reactions (other than having a tough of runny poo for a few days, which honestly, is quite normal for him!).

I would make it very clear to the nurse what you are doing. The practice nurse at my GP called us in, came in with the three jabs in a rush and even as I was asking her why they weren't giving them separately as stated in the red book, she was all ready to go. Thank goodness DS is fine and I guessed it saved us another traumatising trip, but I was not happy at the manner the whole thing was done in. They just seem to expect parents to accept whatever they are doing!

[thumbwitch]

gosh I am at what some of you have to put up with in your practice nurses! I shall make sure I am even more grateful to mine next time I see her.

[angel1976]

thumbwitch - My practice nurse is a witch! She is horrendous, always in a rush... I tried to get my GP to innoculate DS (so far, he has only been jabbed by the nurses in the child health clinics and the GPs and they are way better than her!). I'm just glad we are done now till DS is 3.5! Keeping my fingers crossed that the witch nurse will be gone by then.

[thumbwitch]

that is horrendous - glad for you that your DS coped ok; I'm sure you could have had a cause for making a complaint against her if anything had gone amiss, because they are supposed to ensure you know what your DC is being given so you can consent to it!

Best of luck with her disappearing before your DS needs any more doing