Maternal Factors Key to Compliance with Infant Hepatitis B Prevention.(Brief Article)

2001 JAN 17 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- - by Sonia Bell-Nichols, staff medical writer -- Key factors associated with maternal health care continue to play a significant role in whether or not infants receive appropriate vaccinations for hepatitis B virus, according to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researchers.

Although public policies have recommended that all infants be vaccinated against the virus that causes hepatitis B since 1988, in some instances vaccination practices have fallen short, CDC researchers reported at the 128(th) Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association.

John R. Copeland and a team in the National Immunization Program at CDC are currently analyzing combined data from a four-city study that looked at factors affecting maternal compliance with hepatitis B infant vaccination recommendations. The four U.S. cities included in the study are Dallas, Texas; Detroit, Michigan; Hartford/New Haven, Connecticut; and Atlanta, Georgia.

The title of the Copeland et al. report was "Factors related to maternal compliance with urban perinatal hepatitis B prevention programs."

Over the course of the five-year study, nurses interviewed more than 1,300 hepatitis B surface antigen-positive (HBsAg+) women. Women who are positive for this hepatitis B antigen stand a risk for transmitting the virus to their infants if preventive measures are not taken shortly after birth.

Two cities, Dallas and Detroit, were assessed for the initial report. "In preliminary analyses of Detroit (n=129) and Dallas (n=736) data, we compared mothers whose infants were vaccinated on schedule to those whose infants failed to complete the schedule on time, controlling for area ...