Timeliness and Completeness Rates of Immunization of Children (12-23 Months) in Rural and Urban Communities in Bayelsa State

Background: Immunization is the introduction of vaccines to a non-immune host to resist communicable diseases. It is a cost effective public health intervention. The aim of the study was to compare timeliness and completeness rates of immunization coverage of children aged 12 to 23 months in urban and rural communities in Bayelsa State, Nigeria.

Materials and Methods: A descriptive, cross-sectional study design was used to carry out this study among 427 respondents in urban and rural communities in Bayelsa state. Multistage sampling method was adopted to select study participants to whom semi-structured questionnaires having 4 sections were distributed. Data analysis was done using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 23. Association between study variables was tested using the Chi-squared test and p-value of ≤ 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: Only 13 (6%) and 19 (9%) of children in urban and rural communities respectively were completely immunized (p-value < 0.001). The mean age of children who completed immunization in the rural community was 13.2 months but 10.2 months in the urban. Motivating factors of immunization included free cost, availability of immunization services, proximity to clinics and so on. Child’s ill health, knowledge of mother and fear of complication were barriers to complete immunization. Certain vaccines recorded higher timeliness and completeness rates among the children in the urban community than those in the rural community and these were statistically significant.

Conclusion: Immunization timeliness and completeness rates of children for specific vaccines were good for both urban and rural communities. The urban community however had significantly better timeliness and completeness rates. Various factors were also found to influence timely immunization coverage. It is recommended that social mobilization activities to increase immunization awareness in both urban and rural communities be intensified in Bayelsa State.