
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, September 23, 1994                   TAG: 9409240006
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

COALITION

PARENTS TELL their kids, in so many words, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. But do they live by their own advice? Too often they don't - neglecting to immunize children against childhood diseases being a notable example.

Parents may figure they are doing well to have their kids vaccinated by the time they start school. But children should be immunized as infants, and complete most of their vaccinations by age 2.

Delaying immunization gives preventable diseases a chance to spread, and can mean needless suffering - sometimes death. Early immunization is a prime case of cutting health-care costs through preventive care. Every $1 spent on immunizations, it is estimated, saves $10 in later health care.

That estimate is offered by the Community-Based Health-Care Project in Roanoke. Operating with a grant from the Kellogg Foundation, the project has formed a coalition of health-care providers, consumers and civic-minded businesses working to improve the valley's immunization rate.

It is making progress - 106 children were immunized at a Mill Mountain Zoo day in July - but it doesn't know how much. One big problem the project has clarified is that there is no way to track what children have which shots.

Public health departments and private physicians have records of immunizations, but no way to pull the data together to see how big the need is - or to check records when children visit different facilities. That means missed opportunities for kids to get boosters while being treated for another illness or injury.

Community Hospital, positioning itself as a women's and children's hospital, also has identified early immunization as an important issue. It has linked up with the health-care coalition to create an ongoing program - with public health departments, the Virginia Nurses Association and Lewis-Gale clinic and hospital among the many participants - that will take the effort forward after the project grant runs out.

One of the long-term goals: to set up a system giving all health-care providers valleywide easy access to immunization records.

It's a worthy project. For the foreseeable future, though, success will still depend on parents getting their children fully protected without delay.

by CNB