My 4 year old daughter was vaccinated mostly on schedule through age 2 (minus varicella and flu shots). I had a baby boy last fall, and he is unvaccinated so far. We are considering eventually vaccinating him for MMR, Polio and DTaP, but not until he is older.
We had our daughter's 4 year well check recently, and the doctor brought up vaccinating. He knows DS is unvaxed, and he is generally pretty flexible about that sort of thing. We discussed the option of possibly doing a titer test to see if she is currently immune to measles, mumps, rubella, polio, diptheria, tetanus and pertussis, and if so, then there's really no need to vaccinate again. However, our insurance will not cover the testing- they'll only apply it to our deductible. DD goes to a church-based preschool and is generally pretty healthy. She will go to public school next year, but we're in Texas and already have an exemption form, so no issues there.
So, WWYD - skip the titers and the vaccine? Pay for the titers and then vaccinate her only if they show that she is not immune to something? Skip the titers and go ahead and let her have MMR, DTaP, IPV - if so, which ones? Part of me feels like if she's NOT immune after multiple on schedule doses, I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable vaxing her AGAIN with something that isn't apparently working for her. Part of me thinks that if she's had previous doses, does she really NEED another at 4?
We do plan to eventually vaccinate our son, but we haven't decided yet on a vaccine schedule for him.
Also in the background, if it matters: I had a reaction to DPT as a young child, I had natural measles as a baby prior to the MMR being given, my mom has had measles three times and has no natural immunity to it - she had titers done when pregnant with me to confirm this. I'm healthy as an adult, but my sister and I were sickly as kids - between the two of us we've had measles, chicken pox, meningitis, encephalitis, pneumonia, the flu, mono, and chronic fatigue syndrome. We were both fully vaccinated. My husband must have superior healthy genes though because he's never sick.
We had our daughter's 4 year well check recently, and the doctor brought up vaccinating. He knows DS is unvaxed, and he is generally pretty flexible about that sort of thing. We discussed the option of possibly doing a titer test to see if she is currently immune to measles, mumps, rubella, polio, diptheria, tetanus and pertussis, and if so, then there's really no need to vaccinate again. However, our insurance will not cover the testing- they'll only apply it to our deductible. DD goes to a church-based preschool and is generally pretty healthy. She will go to public school next year, but we're in Texas and already have an exemption form, so no issues there.
So, WWYD - skip the titers and the vaccine? Pay for the titers and then vaccinate her only if they show that she is not immune to something? Skip the titers and go ahead and let her have MMR, DTaP, IPV - if so, which ones? Part of me feels like if she's NOT immune after multiple on schedule doses, I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable vaxing her AGAIN with something that isn't apparently working for her. Part of me thinks that if she's had previous doses, does she really NEED another at 4?
We do plan to eventually vaccinate our son, but we haven't decided yet on a vaccine schedule for him.
Also in the background, if it matters: I had a reaction to DPT as a young child, I had natural measles as a baby prior to the MMR being given, my mom has had measles three times and has no natural immunity to it - she had titers done when pregnant with me to confirm this. I'm healthy as an adult, but my sister and I were sickly as kids - between the two of us we've had measles, chicken pox, meningitis, encephalitis, pneumonia, the flu, mono, and chronic fatigue syndrome. We were both fully vaccinated. My husband must have superior healthy genes though because he's never sick.
