title: Tracking parental attitudes on vaccination across European countries: The Vaccine Safety, Attitudes, Training and Communication Project (VACSATC).
abstract: The paper presents the first results from the European project VACSATC which aimed to track parental attitudes on vaccinations across several European countries. We compared five cross-sectional surveys of parents with children less than 3 years of age in England, Norway, Poland, Spain and Sweden carried out during 2008-2009. Data were collected from 6611 respondents. Two countries used face-to face interviews, one used telephone interviews, and two other countries used mail-in questionnaires. In all countries health professionals were indicated as the most important and trusted source of information on vaccination. The study results also show that parental attitudes on vaccinations in the childhood vaccination programs are generally positive. However, there were differences in attitudes on vaccination between the five countries, possibly reflecting different methods of sampling the respondents, context-specific differences (e.g. level of activity of governmental agencies), but also individual-level parental variation in demographic and socioeconomic status variables.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, National Institute of Public Health-National Institute of Hygiene, 24, Chocimska Str., 00-791 Warsaw, Poland. pstefanoff@pzh.gov.pl
authors.forename: Pawel
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Stefanoff
authors.forename: Svenn-Erik
authors.initials: SE
authors.lastname: Mamelund
authors.forename: Mary
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Robinson
authors.forename: Eva
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Netterlid
authors.forename: Jose
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tuells
authors.forename: Marianne A Riise
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Bergsaker
authors.forename: Harald
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Heijbel
authors.forename: Joanne
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yarwood
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005060:Europe; D005260:Female; D019538:Health Care Surveys; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014611:Vaccination / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D055815:Young Adult