Date of Completion

2022

Document Type

Research Project

Degree Name

Doctor of Medicine

Keywords

COVID-19 Vaccines

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has immensely affected the Philippines. A great deal of changes were perceived by the people as numerous stern guidelines were set by the government, from staying at home in self-quarantine, multiple alternative work arrangements, industries closing due to income losses, to providing efforts in promoting vaccination, thereby alleviating the burden our healthcare system is faced with. As future health providers, it is of utmost importance that medical students are vaccinated to combat the severe effects and complications from COVID-19 infection. Pharmaceutical companies launched a global effort to develop different types of vaccines, currently being rolled out in various parts of the world. These vaccines are relatively new, thus not every interaction with the body is known and safety measures are being imposed as suggested by the World Health Organization (WHO). This study will determine the Adverse Events Following Immunization (AEFI) of available COVID-19 vaccines administered to DLSMHSI College of Medicine Students, A.Y. 2021-2022. It takes an analytical cross-sectional research design which was carried out from October 2021 to June 2022 using a self-administered online questionnaire (through Google Forms), formulated by the investigators. The questionnaire, which underwent participants-driven pre-testing, contained five sections containing a) vaccination information, b) health conditions before and after the vaccination, and c) associated side-effects after the vaccination. The eligible participants were students from the DLSMHSI College of Medicine who received at least one dose of the approved vaccines (Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Oxford/AstraZeneca, CoronaVac, Janssen, and Sputnik V COVID-19 Vaccines) and selected through simple stratified sampling method. The study consisted of 176 respondents of which 117 (66.5%) were female and 59 (33.5%) were male. Further, findings from the data (alpha level of 0.05 and a 95% confidence interval), analyzed using Stata/MP software, showed that sex had no significant relationship with any adverse effects experienced by the respondents after COVID-19 vaccination. The brands of COVID-19 vaccines which were administered to the respondents were also found to have no significant relationship with the adverse effects they have experienced, except for Oxford-Astrazeneca. Finally, as to the significant differences between adverse effects on first dose and second dose, significant differences were found at the respondents’ experiences on pain at the site of injection; fever; muscle pain; headache; loss of appetite and malaise. Meanwhile, no significant differences were found at the respondents’ experiences on pain at swelling at the site of injection; redness at the site of injection; anaphylaxis; thrombocytopenia and seizures. Several limitations of the study were the retrospective and self-reported nature of data collection, the limited number of respondents from different year levels who were able to partake in the study, the representativeness of AEFI experienced for each vaccines due to their limited availability in the country, and the long-term effects of the vaccines in the body may not be investigated.

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