Whooping cough vaccine (including diphtheria, polio and tetanus)

[Newdaddy46]

Hi, my wife who due in November was offered the whooping cough vaccine by the midwife, we looked into the risks etc and made an informed choice to take it.
When my wife went in the following week she was told the injection was also diphtheria, polio and tetanus as well as the whooping cough vaccine.
She was told just as the injection was being prepped.
She had the injection thinking this was normal.
We told this to the midwife the next time we saw her, she was unaware that they were doing the other injections.

As you can imagine we are not happy with this at all.

Has anyone else had this experience?

Thank you.

martin

I had the same injection a couple of weeks ago and from what the nurse said it seemed that it was pretty normal that you had a vaccine that contained a number of different things including whooping cough. I think they may have even said you couldn't get an individual whooping cough vaccine?

This is normal.

There is no vaccine available for pertussis (whooping cough) alone.

This is clearly explained on the NHS Choices website:

www.nhs.uk/conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/pages/whooping-cough-vaccination-pregnant.aspx

which might be useful for other questions.

I just found this on the nhs website

As there is no whooping cough-only vaccine, the vaccine you'll be given also protects against polio, diphtheria and tetanus. Until July 2014, a vaccine called Repevax was used, but from July 2014 the vaccine you'll be offered is called Boostrix IPV. Boostrix IPV is similar to the 4-in-1 vaccine, the pre-school booster that's routinely given to children before they start school. Repevax also protected against polio, diphtheria and tetanus.
Unlike whooping cough vaccines given to babies in the childhood vaccination programme, Boostrix IPV doesn not contain a Hib (Haemophillus influenza tybe b) component. It also has lower levels of diphtheria and tetanus, reducing the risk of localised reactions such as pain, swelling or redness at the injection site.

Thankyou for your response, Foxsticks,
Were you informed by the midwife that you were to get multiple injections before hand so you could research what you were getting? our midwife was under the impression that my wife was just getting the whooping cough.
Clearly we have a break down of communication at our Doctors and this may be affecting many others.

I had mine a few weeks ago. As others have said, the nurse explained to me before I had the injection that there is no single vaccine against whopping cough.

I only had one injection as it was all contained in the same dose.

Dont worry, there is no single whooping cough vaccination, at least definetly not on the nhs. The vaccination is just refered to as whooping cough vacine because thats what they are protecting from. The vaccine used here now is the same as the one used in the USA, who have been vaccinating against whooping cough for longer than us.

I was only told by the nurse, my midwife didn't say too much about it. Tbh, I didn't do any research prior to going I knew that there had been outbreaks of whooping cough over the last few years and was just keen to avoid that.

thank you for all your responses,

Thankyou for putting my mind at rest regarding the contents of the injection.

If the midwife informed us of the contents of the injection we still would have gone ahead, as I would have jumped on the pc and "googled" the vaccine.
We would then had been able to make an informed choice.

Clearly the body that gives the midwife information in this case has failed to keep them informed of new procedures. Which in turn left us with out the information we needed to know.

When we were in the clinic and we told the midwife , she looked quite shocked and got on the phone to find out answers which lead to my wife crying, as you can imagine I was not a happy bunny... no-one likes to be injected with something that they were unaware that they were getting...

many thanks again.

Don't just Google any vaccine ... there are some very agenda led, crackpot sites which look incredibly convincing regarding pregnancy.

Did your wife not want to research the injection she was getting? Don't mean to sound funny but I've not really heard of pregnant women of this generation sitting back and having their husband do the research on their behalf; even if it's a joint decision she's usually the one to read up? Especially as beyond baby's health, it's her arm!

Hi just to clarify,
I (we) use the term "I" and "We" very loosely, we both used the pc/imac/ipad to Google.. (other search engines were used!)
We /I discussed the whopping cough vaccine at length with the midwife, we/i?the wife/ discussed this at length with other mums to be/ mums already at ante natal groups, fellow dads, random strangers in the street... we even went as far as reading the back of the packet... not to sound funny thou'! We (that includes the wife) feel we have read up on the whooping cough vaccine to weigh up the risks and make an informed choice to have it... (not me , the wife, cause me having it would be silly)

The issue I am trying to get across is that as the needle was going into my wives arm the nurse was informing her what else was in the injection...

The issue is we were not informed of the content of the injection.
We were told to book whooping cough vaccination, which we did after WE BOTH carefully researched the issue. We made a choice.. on the information that we were given, only to be told at the last second about the others....
We (as in both of us) would then have looked at google. bing, alta vista, (other search engines are available to be used) to get information, asking random strangers in the street was not an option in this case...
... and now having read up in the injection which the wife received , then yes we would have agreed to the injection. that both of us, not just me. Thats us agreeing for the wife to have it, just for clarity...

Next I write on this or any other forum I will ensure that I have completely made myself clear..

Thankyou

It would be worth you dropping an email to NHS Choices (or leaving a comment on the site) to let them know that you (singular or plural) didn't find their information in that case.

It's the first hit I get with "whooping cough vaccination pregnancy" via Google but they will be paying an individual or company as part of their web design / maintenance to try and make sure the official information is thrown up with a wide variety of search terms / engines. Obviously if you haven't been able to access the info they are failing those doing careful research not to mention the casual searcher.

Exactly same experience here MW referred to it as WhoopingCough. On appt with nurse she explained was the whole suite of vaccinations in one injection. I didn't worry about it. You have to trust the medical professionals especially when you're lining up to give birth!

Hello,

As others have said, the combination vaccine is the one that has been used on pregnant women since the campaign began in 2012. The pregnancy safety study that was done in the UK was on the triple vaccine.
The research that you did will have actually been on the combination vaccine because there is no single whooping cough vaccine.
Below is a patient information leaflet that summarises all of the available scientific information about use of this vaccine in pregnancy, including the study that I mentioned above. Hope this is helpful
www.medicinesinpregnancy.org/Medicine--pregnancy/whooping-cough-vaccine/

Um. .. yeah it's not so much the brand of search engine as hitting Internet search after Internet search and clearly getting in a panic. Extreme/inaccurate views come up on them all!
Having said that as Parallax says the NHS site does explain this clearly.

You seem quite surprised/defensive that we though you meant just you by using "I". As most personal pronouns are widely agreed to be specific it is a good idea to use the correct one, people really don't interchange I/we so it does confuse (especially if you're a man writing on behalf of your wife on a pregnancy forum, which is in itself unusual but happens, it's useful for everyone). The Queen is pretty much the only person who swaps the two words without confusion.

I hope you don't mind my saying so, but you sound kind of wound up OP. I don't think this is worth getting upset about tbh. You have said yourself that you (plural) would have agreed to the vaccination anyway, having all the facts. As a pp has already said, ultimately you need to trust the people who are looking after you and your wife. They are here to look after you both. It doesn't sound like being-hauled-up-in-front-of-the-GMC type errors have been made here. Make a calm complaint if you think it warrants it obviously, but no need to upset yourself (or selves).

I think you might be asking too much of your local midwives - ok, I'm in a big city and have rather low expectations of them, but I don't think you can expect your midwife to tell you everything that might be going on in your GP's surgery.
When I researched the whooping cough vaccine (as I have just hit the 28week mark) I easily found out that it was a combined vaccine. (The NHS website is the only one to be trusted IMO). I wouldn't have expected during my rushed 15 min appointment with my midwife to have a long discussion about the nature of the vaccine. I wanted her opinion on whether to have it or not.
I understand your wife getting upset, I cried over a fish supper the other night because I really really enjoyed it. I'm not really understanding why your upset (but think it's lovely that you are taking her feelings very seriously. My DH just gives me a hug and tells me he can't see what the problem is!)

Actually, the NHS information isn't always crash hot for advice on medications in pregnancy, but that's a whole other thread...

You do sound very wound up. And I don't really understand why your first port of call to read up on the vaccine wasn't the NHS website?

Ok, your midwife should have told you it was other things in with whooping cough. Granted you might want to mention that they should say that to people. But beyond that I'm not sure I see the issue. If your wife was unsure about having the combined vaccination why did she not ask to delay the appointment and do your research again?

Little Peas I did not know that. I am terribly lucky in that I don't take any medication so have (so far) found the NHS website to be full of useful info

The midwives aren't giving it, so may not have made the effort to read up on it themselves.

That doesn't excuse them, if they're advising women to have it then they should have some awareness of what they're recommending. However they may be referring to it as "the whooping cough vaccine" as a shorthand, as that is what is primarily being vaccinated against.