Achieving immunization milestones: Insights from Oman's national coverage survey

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Epidemiology
• Immunization Programs

Background:

• Routine immunization data validation is crucial for assessing public health interventions.
• Understanding sub-national vaccination coverage in Oman is essential for targeted health strategies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine actual immunization coverage in Oman by validating routine data and conducting a community survey.
• To assess vaccination status for various vaccines in children under five across different Omani governorates.

Main Methods:

• A cross-sectional community survey utilizing the WHO cluster sampling method.
• Face-to-face interviews with a pretested electronic questionnaire for data collection.
• Descriptive statistics and chi-square tests for analyzing vaccination outcomes (fully, partially, unvaccinated).

Main Results:

• National vaccination coverage in Oman approached 100%, with fully vaccinated rates between 87% and 99%.
• Omani children had higher full vaccination rates than non-Omani children; Muscat and Dhofar showed lower coverage.
• A significant delay in vaccination (>30 days) was observed as children aged, often due to illness.

Conclusions:

• Oman's high vaccination coverage demonstrates widespread acceptance of its immunization program.
• Sub-national disparities and vaccination delays require attention to maintain high coverage rates.
• Validating administrative data with community surveys is key to understanding real-world immunization coverage.