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The problem
Intervention: Vaccination according to the childhood immunisation schedule (fully vaccinated versus partially vaccinated versus unvaccinated)
Who it was tested with: Scottish children under 18 years with laboratory-confirmed pertussis cases from January 2013 to July 2024.
Children or communities are compared with a group that did not receive the intervention, or followed over years. This is the design that best separates what the intervention did from everything else that changed.
"In a retrospective cohort study, laboratory-confirmed pertussis cases from January 2013 to July 2024 were extracted from the national electronic surveillance system and linked to hospitalisation data from Scottish Morbidity Records and vaccination data from the national immunisations database. Multivariable logistic regression was used to calculate odds ratios (OR) for the association between vaccination status and hospitalisation, adjusted for age, sex, ethnicity and deprivation status." This design uses a comparison group of unvaccinated children and linked administrative data to evaluate vaccination effectiveness against severe pertussis outcomes.
Observational study design limits causal inference; does not account for severity of infection at presentation or other clinical factors; does not distinguish between vaccine types or booster status; potential for residual confounding.
Across countries and designs
3 studies · 2 countries
