Our Office Vaccine Policy

Dear Parents and Guardians,
 
We firmly believe in the effectiveness of vaccines to prevent serious illness and to save lives.
 
We firmly believe in the safety of our vaccines. 

We firmly believe that all children and young adults should receive all of the recommended vaccines according to the schedule published by the Centers for Disease Control and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
 
We firmly believe, based on all available literature, evidence and current studies, vaccines do not cause autism or other developmental disabilities. 
 
We firmly believe that vaccinating children and young adults may be the single most important health-promoting intervention that we perform as healthcare providers, and that you can perform as parents and caregivers. The recommended vaccines and their schedule are the results of years and years of scientific study and data-gathering on millions of children by thousands of our brightest scientists and physicians. 

Vaccination policies are truly a victim of their own success. It is precisely because vaccines are so effective at preventing illness that we are even in a position in which some people are against vaccination. Because of vaccines, many parents have never seen the suffering and complications of a child with polio, tetanus, whooping cough, bacterial meningitis or even chickenpox, or have known a friend or family member whose child died of one of these diseases. Such success in making these tragedies rare can make us complacent about vaccinating, but such an attitude has too often lead to tragic results. 

Over the past 20 years, some people have chosen to not vaccinate their children with the MMR vaccine after a single publication of unfounded suspicions (later retracted) that the vaccine causes autism. As a result of under-immunization, there have been outbreaks of measles and several deaths from complications of measles.
 
A community of appropriately vaccinated children will decrease the likelihood of unvaccinated children from contracting vaccine preventable disease through “herd immunity.” There are people in every community who cannot receive vaccines due to immune system problems, a rare allergy to a vaccine component, or are simply too young to be eligible for certain vaccinations; these people depend upon the protection of herd immunity. People who choose not to vaccinate their healthy children against infectious diseases are putting not only their own children at risk, but also other people’s children. This approach is unacceptable at our practice. 

We are making you aware of these facts to emphasize the importance of vaccinating your child. We recognize that the choice may be a very emotional one for some parents, particularly if a close friend or family member has advised otherwise. We will do everything we can to convince you that vaccinating according to the national, standard schedule is the right thing to do. However, should you have doubts, please discuss these with us in advance of your visit. Please be advised that delaying or “breaking up the vaccines” to give one or two at a time over multiple visits goes against expert recommendations and can put your child at risk for serious illness (or even death) and goes against our medical advice as well. 

Finally, if by your child’s four month checkup, you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your child despite all our efforts, we will ask you to find another healthcare provider who shares your views. We do not keep a list of such providers, nor would we recommend any such physician. Please recognize that by not vaccinating, you are actively choosing to put your child at unnecessary risk for pain and suffering, life-threatening illness, permanent disability, and even death. As medical professionals, we feel very strongly that vaccinating children on schedule with currently available vaccines is absolutely the right thing to do for all children and young adults. Thank you for your time in reading this policy, and please feel free to discuss any questions or concerns that you may have about vaccines with any one of us.
 
Sincerely,
 
Advocare Parsippany Pediatrics