Factors Affecting Completion of Immunization Schedule among Children Below 1 Year in Odranya Village, Arua District.

Abstract

Despite government efforts to have all children below 1 year fully immunized, immunization coverage in Arua District is poor with high dropout rates. According to Arua District Demographics study (2012), there is a high level of non-completion of immunization schedules among children below 1 year. Recently, MoH (2014) in its quarterly Uganda Routine Immunization Performance Report for October - December 2013 indicated high dropout rates of 12% in Arua District.

The report further showed that the District failed to reach the targeted 90% national coverage. Various strategies including Mobile Community Immunization have been done to improve coverage and completion of immunization in Arua District; however, there seems not to be any significant improvement in the completion of immunization schedules of children below1 year. The general objective of this study was to assess factors affecting completion of immunization among children in Odranya village, Arua District.

The study used a descriptive cross-sectional study that used quantitative method of data collection. A total of 322 care-givers participated in the study. The study concluded that; immunization completion level among children was found to be at 97%. This is well above district, regional and national immunization completion levels; completion of immunization schedule among children in Odranya village, Arua district was found to be associated with availability of health workers to administer immunization, marital status and age and positive attitude of the caregivers towards immunization.