Association of vaccination coverage with sociodemographic factors in workers of primary health care centers of Cordoba, Argentina.

Introduction: The activities performed by the health personnel have specific occupational risks making it more susceptible to get infectious diseases. Therefore, all healthcare workers must be properly immunized against vaccinepreventable diseases.

Aims: Assessing the proportion of healthcare workers from the public subsector who are vaccinated and relating the sociodemographic factors with the proportion of the Meningitis vaccination condition of the workers from the primary care level of the city of Córdoba Methods: An observational analytical cross-sectional study was carried out with a sample of 157 workers of the municipal district of Cordoba. A self-administered survey was conducted and univariate and bivariate analyses were performed. For the evaluation of factors related with the vaccination a Chi-Square Test was implemented.

Results: The measures of immunization coverage found were: hepatitis B vaccine 67,5%, anti flu vaccine 66,25%, trabadouble bacterial vaccine 60,51% and triple or double viral vaccine 50,32%. The overall analysis showed higher levels of coverage among those workers with a higher level of education and less seniority. This was also evident among the youngest and the physicians. With important differences depending on the educational level for hepatitis B vaccine, for triple or double viral among the youngest workers and double bacterial for those with less seniority.

Conclusion: The health personnel studied on this research has a vaccination status that is lower than that of the internationally recommended vaccination status. Although, this status is similar to the one reported in several countries it shows that the under-coverage of vaccination among these workers is an extended problem which must be prioritized by health authorities; given the implications for the health of workers and the population these workers assist.