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According to newswise.com, it's now safe for kids even with egg allergies to get a flu shot.   All doctors have to do is observe the child for 30 minutes after getting the shot, much like the procedure for any kind of allergy shot, the Web site reports.  It's also important to "have the shot under the care of a primary care provider, if the reaction to eating eggs is only hives, or an allergist, if the reaction to eating eggs is more serious." Used to be, kids with egg allergies -- even grown-ups -- were warned away from the flu shot because it is prepared with eggs. But, “In a large number of research studies published over the last several years, thousands of egg allergic children, including those with a severe life-threatening reaction to eating eggs, have received injectable influenza vaccine (IIV) as a single dose without a reaction” newswise.com quotes allergist John Kelso, MD, fellow of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI). “The...

What's your take?  Are you vaccinating your 12-year-old for HPV? As we all know, HPV is the human papillomavirus and it causes cervical cancer in girls, along with other cancers.  It makes me uneasy, as I'm sure it does others, to think of my son having sex -- it seems 'way too early to be worried about this -- but I've made arrangements for him to have the vaccine. I became a teenager and young adult in the '70's, when everyone was having sex, all the time, in just about any place, with just about anyone.  Thank God, this was before HIV and AIDS.  But somewhere along the way, I got the virus and though it hasn't harmed me in any way, I don't want the same to happen to my son. Both the Centers for Disease Control  (CDC) and Prevention and the American College of Pediatrics now recommend that both girls and boys be vaccinated against HPV, newswise.com reports. Michael Douglas (probably inadvertently) called attention to its ability to cause he...

I thought so.  As a kid, I had all three -- measles, mumps and chicken pox.  Everyone did.  It was a rite of passage. Vaccines weren't around in those days (the '50s, yes, I'll admit it) and well, you just got whatever was going around.  In those days we went outside and played with all the neighborhood kids, and if Ginny got scarlet fever, I knew I'd be next. I guess sitting behind a computer all day like today, you're a little more protected, but still, we vaccinate our kids to be safe, and I believe you can't enter most public schools unless you are vaccinated (though parents can opt out for medical or religious reasons).  I remember my son receiving the dreaded measles and mumps vaccine as an infant, and watching him like a hawk (there were rumors this caused autism and other terrible things), and about the worst that happened was a high fever and a kid who cried so much when I took him out in the jogging stroller I did something I've never done befo...

Thinking of having an echocardiogram to ferret out those chest pains?  Or an annual pap smear, if you're a 30-to-65-year-old woman?  Or a CT scan of your son's head after he falls off his bike? Fuhgaddeaboutit.  A new study has found that doctors are saying that everything from using feeding tubes in people with advanced dementia to CT scans for minor head injuries is not necessary and should not be done, according to a story by Bruce Japsen at forbes.com. He writes that doctors themselves recognize the lack of necessity for many tests that have been routinely done for decades.  In fact, Japsen writes, they've come up with 90 tests that we're all better off not having. On the same topic, flu shots arenot working in patients over 65, the most vulnerable age group.  Mike Stobbe of the Associated Press reports that, "the vaccine is proving only 9 percent effective in those 65 and older against the harsh strain of the flu that is predominant this sea...

Here's a horrifying fact.  You're far more likely to get the flu from your doctor and his staff than you are the public.  That's because, according to Judith Graham, posting at nytimes.com/newoldage, only 60 percent of healthcare workers get the vaccine. This includes my husband, a dentist, who's cavalier about getting sick (though a recent cold made him whimper like a baby and he wound up giving strep to our son).  All I know is, he better not bring it home to me! http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/11/as-flu-rages-caregiving-suffers/

It's probably not a disease you worry about, here in America, but malaria disproportionately kills people all over the world every year. Now a new vaccine given much hope has turned out not to work. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/health/malaria-vaccine-candidate-produces-disappointing-results-in-clinical-trial.html