Effect of several sociodemographic factors on measles immunization in children of Eastern Turkey

This study was performed to determine the status of measles immunization and the effect of several sociodemographic factors on immunization in children aged between 10 months and 6 years. Using cluster sampling, 663 healthy children were selected at random from three provinces in Eastern Turkey. The immunization histories of these children were obtained from their immunization cards. With respect to their vaccination status, children were categorized as vaccinated, unvaccinated or unknown. If the child had no immunization card, he or she was classified as unknown. Of these children, 81.6% were vaccinated and 15.1% were unvaccinated. The vaccination status was not known in 3.3% of the children. In children aged 10-12 months, the vaccination rate was 68.6%. For age groups of 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-5 and 5-6 years, the vaccination rates were 84.2, 82.2, 85.3, 82.1 and 76.8%, respectively, but these differences were not significant. The vaccination rates increased in parallel with maternal education level (P = 0.009). Also, vaccination rates were significantly correlated with settlement area (P = 0.036), and were higher in urban regions than suburban and rural regions. There was no difference in vaccination rates with respect to gender, paternal education level, number of siblings and socio-economic status. The results of this study show that the level of immunization necessary for measles elimination has not yet been reached in Eastern Turkey. Priority should be given to increase the immunization levels to 90-95% among children.