Screening, Vaccination and Immunisation
What is screening, vaccination and immunisation?
Screening is the process of identifying apparently healthy people who may have an increased chance of a disease or condition. The NHS offers a range of screening tests to different sections of the population.
Finding out about a problem early can mean that treatment is more effective. However, screening tests are not perfect and they can lead to difficult decisions about having further tests or treatment.
Vaccines use your body’s natural defenses to build resistance to specific infections and makes your immune system stronger. Vaccines train your immune system to create antibodies, just as it does when it’s exposed to a disease. However, because vaccines contain only killed or weakened forms of germs like viruses or bacteria, they do not cause the disease or put you at risk of its complications.
We now have vaccines to prevent more than 20 life-threatening diseases, helping people of all ages live longer, healthier lives. Immunisation currently prevents 3.5-5 million deaths every year from diseases like diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, influenza and measles.
What are we doing as a Collaborative?
The Collaborative hosted a joint Lancashire and South Cumbria Screening, Vaccination and Immunisation Workshop on Friday 26th January 2024 to:
- Discuss the emerging Measles situation.
- Explore what the data tells us about screening, vaccination and immunisation in Lancashire and South Cumbria.
- Discuss what the data tells us about each place and identify what the key priorities might be.
- Identify potential priorities for the Collaborative system.
We are working on implementing the actions from the workshop, more on next steps soon!