Good Morning Tampa Bay interview Pediatrician John Aime, who practices medicine at South Florida Baptist Hospital, explains the importance of being immunized whether you are a child or an adult.
All right, joining me this morning is Dr. John Aime from the South Florida Baptist Hospital. Thank you so much for being with us this morning.
Dr. Aime: Thank you for having me.
Yes, so this morning we’re talking about immunizations. Going back to school, we think about a lot of the required shots for kids, but you want to talk about some shots that aren’t necessarily required but recommended.
That’s right. Typically, those kids going back into seventh grade are required to have tetanus and whooping cough boosters. But there are two others that we like to introduce at that point. There’s a shot for meningococcal meningitis, a meningitis shot that is for a very serious illness, and there’s also the HPV vaccine.
So, HPV is a virus that can cause cancers, and it’s believed that about 80 to 90% of adults will be exposed to it sometime in their life. The cancers include cervical cancer, penile cancer, throat cancer, and anal cancer, as well as genital warts, which are not going to kill you but are hard to treat, embarrassing, and painful. We like to stress those and get them done at that age, where they are the most effective. And of course, the flu vaccine is available now, so people should plan on getting that in the next month or two.
Right. Now, if kids’ parents or adolescents are concerned they can’t bring their kids to the doctor, what is another way that people can get these vaccinations?
Well, there’s a mobile medical clinic, which actually will take the vaccines into the communities and provide them to people directly. They also offer well-child-care evaluations.
That’s perfect. Once we have this interview up on our website, we will have the list and times of the mobile care clinics.
