Are vaccines mandatory if working in the NHS?

[Tryinghard19]

Been offered a hybrid admin role with the NHS that requires mostly admin work, with limited home
visited to start paperwork with patients.

I received my paperwork the other day, which includes DBS, plus a detailed health questionnaire which requests dates and evidence of quite a large number of vaccinations. Are these mandatory for securing a role within the NHS does anyone happen know?

My last vaccines were DTAP around 10 years ago and I’m not really keen to potentially have to have several vaccines, HEP B, MMR plus others, when I’m not performing clinical tasks. My husband had a bad reaction to the Covid vaccine and still has issues even now, so it’s made me really wary sadly.

Any advice would be much appreciated please . I did call HR who sent the docs out but they didn’t know the answer! 🤦🏽‍♀️

Nope.

No

Thank you. It’s just the health questionnaire reads like it is that’s all, so it’s got me worried. I’ve had as real ow r the years but I don’t really want anymore. I called the external company that does the questionnaire and they said it might be that I’d be called into have an OH appointment and to have vacs any I’m missing, but even she couldn’t tell me if they were mandatory or not. She said it’s likely I go into people’s home.

None of them are mandatory. Some are recommended.

If you haven’t had them you more than likely will get called for a meeting with occ health. If you are non clinical I don’t think they are mandatory.

My vaccine record was patchy because it didn’t transfer properly when I moved to the uk so I didn’t have proof. They were happy enough to do antibody blood test to confirm I had immunity.

Thanks everyone, that’s really helpful. He’s asking for evidence of all sorts of things like blood test evidence for HIV1 etc, which I’m pretty sure I would’ve had during each of my pregnancies so we’ll call with the GP surgery again tomorrow. They don’t seem to have records for any of my vaccines before the age of 12 though.

I just really don’t want to have anything else vaccine wise now but similarly I don’t want to go through the whole process to be told that they withdrawing the job offer. I’d rather know now. I think I’m going to end up having an appointment with OH and we’ll go from there.

They'll try to persuade but it's not mandatory. Nobody can force a medical procedure on anyone. (Although they did try to enforce the second covid one but backed down, i was very annoyed as only had it as they said you wouldn’t be able to work past March 2021 without it and then they changed the ruling). The OH appointment is more of a chat than a medical in my experience.

They will take blood to check for any they need if you dont have proof (eg for work in children's hospital they check for antibodies to make sure you had childhood diseases or vaccinations).. I tend to have adverse reactions to vaccines so try to avoid unless essential but am clinical and may come into contact with body fluids so did take the Hep B ones. I've never had a flu one despite pressure every year over 20+ years of working (I've also never had the flu🤷)

Mossstitch you give me hope thank you. I thought my new job was over before it hasn’t even began, but maybe it will all be okay.