Over the past thirty years, childhood vaccine programs across the country have grown exponentially.
Bridget Abshear, a Program Planner with Clackamas County Public Health (CCPH) in Oregon, noted that, “In 1995, children were vaccinated against nine diseases, but today most children are vaccinated against 18. This is great news for protecting children’s health, but as protection has expanded so have costs. Funding hasn’t been able to keep pace with these increases and Oregon, like many other states, has found it challenging to meet our population’s immunization needs.”
Clackamas County has seen a steady decrease in childhood vaccination rates over the past two decades. “We’d like to see a 95+% kindergarten vaccination rate to ensure best protection in our county,” explained Kevin Staley, Program Planner at CCPH. “Unfortunately, we’re currently hovering around 86%, and the repercussions of that gap are real. We had a statewide measles outbreak in 2024 that affected nine people in our county.”
“The decrease in vaccination is due to many factors, from vaccine hesitancy and misinformation, policy and funding challenges, and increasing gaps in equity and access,” Kevin said. To better understand the decline in vaccination rates within the county, CCPH partnered with the Northwest Center for Public Health Practice (NWCPHP) in the fall of 2023 to analyze the vaccination situation within the county and develop recommendations for improvements.
“Like most public health organizations, we have existed in a rapidly changing environment since the pandemic,” Bridget pointed out. “We wanted to define what a functional immunization program that meets the needs of our community looks like in this ‘post-Covid’ world. Our goals were to expand coverage and modernize our programs, and we reached out to NWCPHP because our internal data teams were already working at capacity.”
An evaluation team from NWCPHP conducted qualitative interviews of immunization providers and analyzed the data. They presented this information, along with a series of program recommendations, to the team at CCPH. Recommendations touched upon ways to improve policy development, increase communication, cultivate cross-sectional partnerships, and increase equitable access to vaccine programs across the county.
“This report helped us understand why vaccine rates are so low in our county and also showed us some gaps in our existing services,” Kevin said. “That sort of granular data has been extremely informative and has allowed us to take an evidence-based approach when reviewing and revising our programs.”
“The team from NWCPHP was great, and we had a very positive experience working with them,” Bridget noted. “They were extremely communicative and responsive and were willing to be nimble and pivot when we needed them to.”
“In addition to informing our program revisions, we’ve shared the report they generated with the State and presented the information to the Oregon Public Health Association. We also recently shared our findings in a Hot Topics In Practice webinar,” a monthly webinar forum hosted by NWCPHP.
The evaluation team at NWCPHP provides a wide range of evaluation services that help governmental public health agencies, non-profits, and clinical organizations make informed decisions about the quality and effectiveness of their programs. To learn more about the evaluation team and their services, contact Megan Rogers to schedule a consultation call.
