Children's Immunisations - MMR

A child of any age whose parents request it can be immunised against measles, mumps and rubella. The MMR vaccine (two doses) can also be given to non-immune adults and should be considered for those in long-term institutional care who may not have developed immunity.

Entry into college, university or other centres for further education provides an opportunity to check the individual's immunisation history.

Students who have not received vaccination against measles and rubella with or without mumps vaccination should be offered MMR vaccination, and are eligible for a Meningitis ACWY vaccine.

Protecting your child against flu…………………

Healthy children aged 2 - 3 years are now offered the flu vaccine. At the same time, children aged 2 to 10 in certain areas of the country will also be offered the vaccine. The aim is to vaccinate all children in the country aged from 2 to 16 against flu and these areas of the country are being used to see what is the most practical and acceptable way of achieving this aim. The vaccine will be in the form of a nasal spray that is easily and painlessly administered.

There are 2 elements to the children’s flu immunisation programme:

• a routine offer of vaccination to all 2 - 3 year olds
• geographical pilots for 4 to 10 year olds (up to and including pupils in school year 6)

Your surgery is involved in providing this service in this year’s flu season

Extending the flu programme to all children will involve considerable planning and work in order to obtain a high level of uptake. For this reason, the programme will be rolled out over a number of seasons and will include pilots, allowing Public Health England and NHS England time to find out the most effective way of implementing it.

If you have not heard from the surgery and your child falls into the above age groups (2-3 years), and you would like your child to be vaccinated, please contact the surgery.

Influenza and Pneumococcal Vaccinations

In accordance with Department of Health guidelines, we recommend an annual influenza and a single one-off pneumonia vaccination for patients over the age of 65 and for those under 65 with diabetes, chronic heart, lung or kidney disease and residents of nursing and rest homes. The vaccination is available from September each year. Please contact the practice for further detail