Relationship between parent held child records for immunisations, parental recall and health service

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Health Informatics
• Child Health

Background:

• Parent Held Child Records (PHCR) were implemented in Ireland in 2008 to track child health information.
• Assessing the accuracy of PHCRs and parental recall against official health records is crucial for monitoring immunisation coverage.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the concordance between PHCRs, parental recall, and Health Service Executive (HSE) records for childhood immunisation uptake.
• To evaluate the reliability of PHCRs and parental recall as sources of immunisation data.

Main Methods:

• The Lifeways cohort study, including 1070 children, was used to compare immunisation data.
• Immunisation data from PHCRs (at one year), parental recall (at five years), and HSE records were cross-referenced.

Main Results:

• PHCRs captured primary immunisations for 92.8% of children compared to HSE records.
• Parental recall was accurate for 96.7% of children.
• Agreement between PHCRs and HSE records was 75.9%, while agreement between parental recall and HSE records for MMR vaccines was 91% (p < 0.001).
• PHCRs tended to underestimate immunisation status, whereas parental recall tended to overestimate it relative to HSE records.

Conclusions:

• While parental recall demonstrates high accuracy for immunisation status, PHCRs may underestimate coverage.
• Discrepancies between PHCRs, parental recall, and official HSE records highlight the need for robust data validation in childhood immunisation monitoring.