I’m Unvaccinated

[UnDeadPool]

Not looking for a fight - just want some advice.

It came up in conversation with my mum today that I wasn’t vaccinated as a baby. I had no idea. Maybe I shouldn’t have but I just presumed that I was.

She said she took me for the first one and it made my arm swell up so never took me back.

She’s also pretty sure I had measles as an infant but isn’t sure as she never took me to the doctor for confirmation.

I can remember having my tb needle at school when I was about 9/10 (I have the scar) and having a jab when I was 12/13 in secondary school (don’t know what this was for)

Is it too late for me to have my vaccinations now? I’m almost 38. Googling just brings up over 60 flu jab

Thanks.

Not too late. I'd start with tetanus!!
It's funny though, coz friend wasn't vac'd so got almost everything & remembers it all (Mumps, whooping cough, etc.). I'm surprised you didn't know before, which makes me think you got a fair few more than your ma remembers.

It's definitely worth asking - when my DD was a baby there was a measles outbreak in our area and I had to take her to the hospital for an early MMR at 6 months old. The doctor asked me if I'd had mine and I said I presumed so, he asked me my year of birth and based on that he worked out that the combined jab hadn't been available so did me as well "just in case".

I'd give your surgery a ring and see what they say. Good luck!

Go ask your gp. I asked ours and was amazed to find all my vaccinations on the computer. Easy to work out what I needed.

@LemonySippet yes I had something similar (born in 1978) and questions about incomplete MMR

Make and appointment and speak to your GP about it. If you've had some vaccinations, they should be on your medical records. They will be able to work out what you need to have to get yourself fully covered. Unfortunately, with anti-vaccers increasingly spreading rubbish on social media, there isn't the herd immunity that there used to be, so it's still worth getting vaccinated if you haven't been.

The 12/13yo one was probably rubella.

Thank you.

I’m currently pregnant and due to have a whooping cough jab on Wednesday (this is what started the conversation) so will speak to the surgery then.

@ragged I think I may have had mumps too as I can vaguely remember having painful lumps in my neck, but not sure if I’m imagining it now I know I’ve never been immune.

I wonder which one your mum thinks you had a first dose of? DTP? I might be older than you, but the Polio vaccination was given on a sugar lump when I was a child (1970s), so not an injection. I wasn't vaccinated against anything else, including Rubella and TB. My DSis had very bad doses of Mumps and Measles, and the GP said it was impossible for me not to have immunity as a result (I had a bad cold when DSis had Measles). So it's possible you are immune even if you weren't vaccinated.

I don't think mumps was standardly given until late 80s at least. I know me nor my siblings didn't have it (or measles) and had the illnesses instead.
Are you allergic to eggs? I think the hooping cough one is grown on eggs or something.

Mumps was never available singly, only as part of MMR (which is not given during pregnancy as it is a live vaccine). If your measles vax status is unknown, and you were born after 1970, then you can get MMR on NHS

The whooping cough vaccine given during pregnancy is the DPT jab. It wouid certainly be worth asking his many shots you need to count as a complete course.

She doesn’t remember, just that I Had a reaction to a vaccine so she refused to take me back.

No allergies.

Would a simple blood test be able to detect immunity? I doubt I can be vaccinated fully whilst pregnant but I’ve got a feeling this is going to play on my anxiety.

If youve go this far and you’re fine...why bother
Sounds like you have a strong immune system.

I know my measles was low after I had DD and was offered a top up - so mention it to the midwife and see what they test for. I know they test for AIDS and Measels there must be others

I'd definitely look into it, lots of illnesses are worse as an adult, you'll be spending more time with young children who are good at spreading disease and some of whom will be unvaccinated, and the last thing you need with young children at home is to come down with an entirely preventable children.

You need to talk to your Practice Nurse and get it sorted. You will have to wait until you have had the baby to get up to date, apart from Whooping cough and flu vaccine which should be offered to you while pregnant. There is a catch up regime for non or partially immunised, which I will attempt to attach to this post.
www.england.nhs.uk/south/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2016/04/phe-uncertain-vacc-algorithm-sept15.pdf

I believe that there was some controversy around the whooping cough vaccine in the 70’s and I never had it. I had whooping cough when I was in primary school, I remember it well and I always get the most terrible coughs which the dr’s believe is a hang over from the whooping cough

I caught mumps and measles as a child. I remember my mum telling me that the GPs were reticent to immunise me as a child as my father had epilepsy (this was in the 70s). I did have tetanus, the BCG and rubella vaccines as a teen, as well as ones like cholera when I went abroad and was fine, apart from feeling that I had a lead weight in my arm!

Thanks for your help. I’ll be speaking to the midwife on Wednesday.

dowser that could be true but I don’t want to take it as a given.

They can do a blood test to see what you have immunity to - advise what you should do if exposed when pregnant - and how to catch up with the vaccs once you have your baby. As you might not have immunity to some things you won't be passing on any immunity for those illnesses and as as herd immunity is lower now i'd rather know so I could know to be very careful with my baby.

Melfish there wasn’t a measles vaccine in the seventies, so you wouldn’t have had it, but there was a perceived risk with the Whole-cell pertussis (Whooping cough) vaccine and epilepsy. The Whole-cell WC vaccine was discontinued in the late eighties.

I depends how old you are - not all vaccinations were available for oldies like me. I don't think I was vaccinated because I remember having mumps and measles. I do remember having the polio sugar lump though so there is one at least I won't get There is no one left to ask now.

This is a bit niche, but if anyone is interested in vaccines, when they started and stats on their effect across the population, then this is the GP/PN ‘bible’.
www.gov.uk/government/collections/immunisation-against-infectious-disease-the-green-book

The chapters on the individual vaccines start with a section on the history and stats of each vaccine.

This thread has made me realise I've not been vaccinated for mumps and I've never had it. I've had measles and chickenpox. Should a middle-aged person like me worry about that?

'there wasn’t a measles vaccine in the seventies'

This is not correct. The measles jab was introduced in 1968.

I had measles just before that.
The single jab is effect, and was combined with rubella into the double measles shot and then into MMR which first became available in 1988. MMR became the only form of measles shot on NHS in 1998.

Well I’m 36 and never had the MMR because it wasn’t available. I had already ha mumps and ruebella as well.

Presumably the single jabs weren’t part of a normal schedule when I was little.