In honor of National Immunization Awareness Month, I welcome Dr. Nicole Baldwin. She is a fellow general Pediatrician and mother and we have a heart to heart about vaccines. The myths we hear, how we approach vaccine hesitancy, the reason we vaccinate ourselves, our children, and why we promote vaccination for our patients.

00;00;06;14 – 00;00;36;11

Dr. Mona

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the PedsDocTalk podcast. I’m your host, Doctor Mona, where each week I hope to educate and inspire you in your journey through parenthood with information on your most common concerns as a parent and interviews with fellow parents and experts in the field. My hope is you leave each week feeling more educated, confident, and empowered in decisions you make for your child.

 

00;00;36;14 – 00;00;54;29

Dr. Mona

Hello everyone! Welcome to this episode. I am so excited because I have Doctor Nicole Baldwin, who is a fellow general pediatrician, and we are talking all about vaccines and how we feel about vaccines as both mothers and pediatricians. So thank you, Doctor Baldwin, for being here.

 

00;00;55;01 – 00;00;57;12

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited.

 

00;00;57;14 – 00;01;20;26

Dr. Mona

So I started following Nicole Doctor Baldwin on Instagram. I actually was never on any other social media platform, but Doctor Baldwin is actually, in my opinion, the the guru on social media because she’s on many different platforms. She’s on Facebook, on Twitter, on TikTok, on Instagram, and she has her own blog. So I have not been able to venture out into any other social media platform.

 

00;01;21;00 – 00;01;30;15

Dr. Mona

But she is a wealth of information, so I’m so glad we were talking about all this today because there’s no one. There’s no one else I wanted to talk to this about.

 

00;01;30;18 – 00;01;32;24

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

You’re so sweet. Thank you.

 

00;01;32;26 – 00;01;58;17

Dr. Mona

So, like. Like I said, we’re. We wanted to have this conversation for all of you. Because we know that there is some vaccine hesitancy out there. People have a lot of questions, but we’re just talking mother to mother, pediatrician to pediatrician on the things that we see in our office, why we promote vaccination. And just some, you know, struggles that we have dealing with vaccine hesitancy and just messages that we have for all of you when deciding to vaccinate your children.

 

00;01;58;19 – 00;02;02;24

Dr. Mona

So, first of all, Doctor Baldwin, how many years have you been practicing?

 

00;02;02;26 – 00;02;05;17

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

I have been practicing for 13 years.

 

00;02;05;20 – 00;02;07;21

Dr. Mona

Awesome. And you have two children?

 

00;02;07;24 – 00;02;16;20

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

I have two children. I have, well, one is an adult, 24 year old son, and, a 16 year old daughter.

 

00;02;16;27 – 00;02;24;26

Dr. Mona

And what actually kind of going back, what prompted you to get on social media in the first place to do education and and what you do for general? Yeah.

 

00;02;24;26 – 00;02;54;28

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

So initially I did the social media for my practice. And as a way to educate families beyond what we could do in the office. And so I decided to get on personally because, I’m in a practice with 15 other providers. And so it was challenging to have my own voice. And so I felt the need to kind of get out there and talk to families, because I was saying the same things over and over and over again in the office.

 

00;02;55;01 – 00;03;03;09

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And so I thought, wow, okay. Maybe if I get this out there on social media, I can help people that aren’t in the office that day or whatever. So, yeah.

 

00;03;03;09 – 00;03;24;23

Dr. Mona

And and people outside of your area of, of where you’re practicing, right? Yeah. So cool. And that’s exactly why I got on. And so when I joined Instagram and I can’t obviously, I can’t remember how I found you or how we found each other, but it was so nice. It’s obviously amazing seeing all the other general pediatricians on social, sharing evidence based information and just, you know, their perspective as, as mothers, fathers, whatever it is.

 

00;03;24;24 – 00;03;39;26

Dr. Mona

So again, thank you for being here. So the first question I have is why do you vaccinate and not even just promote vaccination for your for your patients? But why do you vaccinate yourself? Why do you vaccinate your your children? Let’s start there.

 

00;03;39;29 – 00;04;07;20

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah, that’s a great question. So definitely, I mean, I vaccinate myself and my kids to prevent vaccine preventable diseases in us, of course, but I also vaccinate to protect other people so people who can’t be vaccinated. I think it’s important that I make sure I’m as safe as possible. My kids are as safe as possible, so we don’t spread anything inadvertently to someone who maybe can’t be vaccinated for whatever reason.

 

00;04;07;20 – 00;04;15;22

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

They’re too young. They’re too old. They’re, you know, have some sort of immune deficiency. So that’s why I do it.

 

00;04;15;24 – 00;04;31;21

Dr. Mona

Yeah. Same with me. I mean, I think the the issue here is there is a sort of misconception that, oh, well, if I’m healthy, why do I need to vaccinate? Because I just won’t, you know, I won’t get it. I don’t I’m not going to spread it to anyone. But the reality is we we do this because of protecting the most vulnerable.

 

00;04;31;21 – 00;04;42;28

Dr. Mona

Also, we obviously are vaccinating our our children to protect them and protect others. So I, I love that answer. Any do you have any stories of vaccine preventable illnesses that you’ve seen?

 

00;04;43;01 – 00;05;12;29

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah. I mean, I think I trained in the era that was mostly post vaccine, you know, but I’ve seen a handful. Obviously, I’ve seen flu, and chickenpox and pertussis. But one thing I, I was thinking about this. So the rotavirus vaccine came out. It was licensed the year I finished residency. So wrote it. And you may you may not even when did you finish residency?

 

00;05;13;02 – 00;05;17;19

Dr. Mona

2000. Seven, five years ago. So 2015.

 

00;05;17;19 – 00;05;52;21

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Okay, okay. All right. So I’m a little older than you. I finished in 2006. So, so back in the day, rotavirus used to be all over the place. We would admit kids all the time with dehydration from rotavirus, gastroenteritis, like diarrhea, vomiting, and, I remember so this vaccine comes out right when I started practicing. And so the first couple of years of practice, we still would see it, you know, kids, I think before vaccination, I mean, hundreds of thousands of office visits every single year for rotavirus.

 

00;05;52;24 – 00;06;10;04

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And you never forget the smell of rotavirus. Let me tell you, you can smell it down the hallway. It was awful. And and these kids would get really sick. Even when I was in residency, we had one kid when I was in the ICU that actually had to get admitted. We had to code her because she was so dehydrated.

 

00;06;10;06 – 00;06;32;29

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And she almost died. From that. So really scary. And then fast forward a couple years into practice after we’d been giving the rotavirus vaccine, and I never, hardly ever see rotavirus anymore. I can’t remember the last time I saw rotavirus. So, it’s kind of cool to have that story to be like, yeah, I remember before we had that vaccine, and now that we have that vaccine, we just don’t see it anymore.

 

00;06;33;00 – 00;06;35;06

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

So that’s kind of that’s pretty cool.

 

00;06;35;08 – 00;06;54;20

Dr. Mona

That is actually that’s awesome. I yeah, obviously, like you said, I was in training when the rotavirus has been around. And so I, I actually work with a colleague who has been practicing for 45 years. Yeah. And he talks a lot more about that. So it’s so amazing to see the progression of all these different vaccines and to kind of go on that comment.

 

00;06;54;20 – 00;07;16;17

Dr. Mona

I think a lot of families who may be vaccine hesitant, they you know one of the comments that they say is well why are there so many. Well you guys basically are vaccinated against everything. I think they have to understand that the vaccines are being chosen for things that cause morbidity, mortality or complications long term. We’re not vaccinating against hand, foot and mouth, right, because hand, foot and mouth doesn’t cause you.

 

00;07;16;20 – 00;07;39;22

Dr. Mona

I mean, maybe, you know, there’s it’s hard to find a vaccine, but it doesn’t cause you permanent damage. And it may cause any complications, but rotavirus meningitis, these are all things that actually can cause lifelong implications. Or they can cause, obviously, you know, mortality. So I think, you know, and that’s a prime example, obviously children getting so dehydrated that they’re getting admitted to hospitals if we can prevent that.

 

00;07;39;22 – 00;07;47;11

Dr. Mona

Right. Kind of like the flu vaccine, right. If we can prevent it, why not? I think that’s an important concept that people people need to hear.

 

00;07;47;11 – 00;08;14;26

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah, yeah. And I just think so many parents these days, just like you said, haven’t seen these illnesses, don’t know anybody that’s had these illnesses. And so, yeah, they look at risk. They are what? Perceived risk, I guess I should say, of the vaccine versus actually thinking about the illness and how devastating so many of these illnesses can be, for kids and adults.

 

00;08;14;29 – 00;08;40;24

Dr. Mona

Yeah. And I think, you know, I think if you were, if you’re a pediatrician and you’ve gone through residency, I think every pediatrician will have a story that, you know, they’ll always hold in their heart of a vaccine preventable illness. You know, for me, you know, you have the rotavirus. For me, it was a human patient. So a cancer patient who had cancer, who obviously is immunocompromised, who ended up getting chickenpox from a classmate and dying from chickenpox.

 

00;08;40;24 – 00;09;02;02

Dr. Mona

He actually didn’t die from the cancer, but he was so immuno compromised. And he, you know, for for everyone listening, when you’re immunocompromised, you can’t get certain vaccines, so you can’t get the chickenpox vaccination, because your body’s not able to handle that vaccine. So you have to hope that everyone around you is getting that vaccine. And I will never forget that child.

 

00;09;02;02 – 00;09;22;13

Dr. Mona

I will never forget the child’s name, the mom crying and I. It’s just so unfortunate that he was actually doing really well with his cancer. Yeah, and he passed away from chickenpox and it’s it’s one of those stories that I mean, there’s so many, like you said, pictures I’ve seen I’ve seen I’ve seen Hib meningitis and I’ve seen a healthy young girl, 18 month old, who subsequently had hearing loss.

 

00;09;22;13 – 00;09;43;26

Dr. Mona

This is why we sit here, in an evening and record this episode, because we really just care so much about the safety of our kids. And I think people, you know, the misconception that pediatricians are out to harm kids with vaccines, it just breaks my heart because why would we want to do anything for a child and our own?

 

00;09;43;28 – 00;10;03;17

Dr. Mona

By the way, I vaccinate Ryan on schedule. Like, I mean, people are like, you’ve like, I have some people will message like, oh, you chose to vaccinate him even though he had a seizure and Bertram, I’m like, what is that? Yeah, that’s that’s not even really right. Yeah. This is I’m going to vaccinate because that’s the best thing to do for my son and also anyone he comes in contact with.

 

00;10;03;17 – 00;10;15;15

Dr. Mona

Right. But it’s just so sad that the lack of trust that’s been created in many, you know, obviously social media with pediatricians and with the medical community when we really are trying to help children.

 

00;10;15;15 – 00;10;35;26

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Right? We I mean, we love kids. I went into pediatrics because I love kids. And it’s just like you said. And I say that all the time to why in the world would I not just vaccinate my patients, but vaccinate my own children? If I thought for a second that that it was going to be harmful to them?

 

00;10;35;28 – 00;10;55;01

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

My children are fully vaccinated with everything, including HPV. You know, they’ve had it all. They get a flu shot every year, like my kids. Yeah. And so, you know, never in a million years would I ever want to harm any children, and especially not my own. So I feel you on that.

 

00;10;55;03 – 00;11;09;07

Dr. Mona

And it’s, it’s it’s almost like, you know, when I have those conversations and I do bring in the personal, like, if I’m talking to a vaccine hesitant family or someone who’s more on the other side where they’re not going to vaccinate at all, and I tell them, you know, they’re like, are you vaccinating your son? And I’m like, yeah, I do.

 

00;11;09;09 – 00;11;26;16

Dr. Mona

And I’ve had awful things said to me. I mean, like things like, well, I feel sorry for your child. Like, you know, I wish save your child. And I’m like, I literally have had to have, you know, office managers come involved because I’m like, wow, this is extremely rude and personal. Yeah. And I’m not even attacking you, right?

 

00;11;26;17 – 00;11;54;29

Dr. Mona

I’m just giving you medical information. Can you just. This was when I was pregnant, by the way. Yeah. And it’s it’s so heartbreaking because literally for anyone who is not familiar, Jen, we work extremely hard. We work hard for very low pay compared to other or other specialties. And we do it because, like Doctor Baldwin said, we really love kids and we don’t want to see your kids in the office, sick, in the hospital, intubated, sick on fluids, all this stuff.

 

00;11;54;29 – 00;12;03;19

Dr. Mona

Right? This is why we we promote this. It’s public health. It’s it’s the benefits are there. And we want your children to be healthy.

 

00;12;03;21 – 00;12;04;28

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah.

 

00;12;05;00 – 00;12;17;11

Dr. Mona

Is there any other vaccine you know anti-vaccine myths or you know the things that they say that it’s hard for you to kind of do you hear it. And you’re like why are we saying that. Kind of similar to the ones that, you know, pediatricians don’t vaccinate their kids.

 

00;12;17;13 – 00;12;53;27

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah. Well, I, I think the one that circulates a lot, these days, is that someone at the World Health Organization, they take it they took a clip out of something. And this person said that physicians only get a half a day of training, about vaccines during medical school. And that is just not true. I mean, I just and and it’s so frustrating because no matter how much on social media we say it’s not true, no matter how many people say it’s not true, every time an anti-vaccine, you know, person kind of comes at me on social media, that’s one of the things that they will say.

 

00;12;53;27 – 00;13;15;25

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And I’m just, you know, like we not only did we train in infectious disease and immunology and, you know, microbiology and all of those things through medical school, but then add three years of pediatric residency on top of that, add my 13 years of clinical practice, like I I’ve done more than half a day, studying vaccines.

 

00;13;15;28 – 00;13;17;23

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

It just drives me nuts.

 

00;13;17;23 – 00;13;41;05

Dr. Mona

Oh, that I agree completely because that and also what we said earlier that we not only are studying the microbiology, the vaccines, but we’re also studying the illnesses that they cause. So and we’ve seen those. So when you when I said with my stories like when you see those actually in front of you holding the hands of these children and these parents that, gosh, if they, if we could just have prevented this with the vaccine, it really hits home.

 

00;13;41;05 – 00;14;01;12

Dr. Mona

And you’re never going to forget those pieces. And you know, when I’m in my office and if I am dealing with a family that is more hesitant, I, I bring in those stories and I also just say, you know, this is all for a reason. Like, we’re not sitting here having this conversation. I’m not pleading with you and educating you and going on social media like you are to bust all these myths.

 

00;14;01;14 – 00;14;24;04

Dr. Mona

You know, we do it. We’re doing it because it’s what we need to do so that people understand that this is for the best interest of these children. My, my my biggest one beyond that is the big pharma that when you know when they say oh how much are you getting paid to promote vaccines. And I mean I, I don’t know how much debt you had, but I came out of medical school with $370,000 of debt.

 

00;14;24;07 – 00;14;27;01

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Wow. I didn’t have quite that much. But I had a lot.

 

00;14;27;03 – 00;14;46;12

Dr. Mona

Yeah. I mean, it’s been a struggle. And so when people say that, oh, you’re getting paid by Big Pharma, and me and my husband are living in a two bedroom apartment, leasing cars, paying off our loans aggressively with my entire salary, which is not paid by big Pharma, because, yeah, I get paid a lot as an occupation. I’m like, wait, what?

 

00;14;46;12 – 00;15;06;14

Dr. Mona

And and I tell them I’m like, can you? And it’s usually all in caps, like, oh yes it is. And then they put money symbols and I’m like, I’m just like, stop spewing just things that you’re reading off the script, like, think for a second about what we’re doing here. Right. If a general if we were all getting paid by big Pharma, I’m pretty sure I would not be on social media.

 

00;15;06;14 – 00;15;08;16

Dr. Mona

I would be in a yacht in the Bahamas.

 

00;15;08;19 – 00;15;15;15

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Right? Yeah, I would, I would be too. I mean, I I’ve been waiting for that check to come in for a long time and there’s nothing going on.

 

00;15;15;18 – 00;15;32;11

Dr. Mona

There’s nothing like it. And then the other thing is, you know, when they talk about that, I the reason I get I’m like confused is that if you actually go to the pediatrician, vaccines are actually very cheap if you pay out of pocket. So like in our practice, for example, if you don’t have insurance, one vaccine only costs $10.

 

00;15;32;13 – 00;15;48;06

Dr. Mona

If you don’t have insurance, if you have insurance, they’re completely covered. Yeah. So if it was big pharma they would be it’s like, you know, they would be charging obscene amounts because they’re trying to make money off of you. But so cheap these things are free. And you can go to the Department of Health and get it for free.

 

00;15;48;08 – 00;15;48;29

Dr. Mona

Right? So right.

 

00;15;49;01 – 00;16;12;00

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And as pediatricians, we don’t make like vaccines are not a moneymaker in our office. They’re just not. And the amount that they cost to store and you know, keep and, you know, maintain it’s it’s actually a lot. And so there’s a lot of cost associated with them. But we do it obviously, and we have vaccines because that’s what we believe in.

 

00;16;12;00 – 00;16;21;00

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And we want to vaccinate these kids. So it is frustrating when people think we’re making bank off of vaccines. We’re not.

 

00;16;21;02 – 00;16;39;01

Dr. Mona

We’re not. And it’s like it’s you know, that actually hurts a lot because then I’m like, well, I don’t understand that concept because I really I mean, what we do as general pediatricians is not for the money. And it’s there’s that money is not coming from anywhere. And it’s like, you can tell these, you can tell them all you want that, hey, this is not happening.

 

00;16;39;01 – 00;17;02;05

Dr. Mona

It’s like they just keep saying it like, oh, big right? I’m a big. I’m like, oh, we just actually have a honest conversation. Or it’s just it’s so hard. It’s so it is, it’s so hard. Do you like how do you approach vaccine hesitancy in your office? Like when you get those families that want to space out or don’t want to vaccinate, like, how do you what are the words you use and how do you maybe even encourage them?

 

00;17;02;07 – 00;17;24;03

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Well, yeah, I think so. Definitely. I always talk to the families, and the one thing I always try to do is ask what their questions are or what their fears are. Because I think that, I can assume you know something, but that may not be at all what they’re afraid of. And, you know, in our practice, we actually have a policy.

 

00;17;24;03 – 00;17;44;05

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

So, for families who choose completely not to vaccinate, we actually ask them to find a different, provider because we feel that we want to protect our most vulnerable patients. And so we feel like it’s important for all children to be vaccinated that are coming into our office. But for our families that choose to delay a little bit, you know, definitely.

 

00;17;44;05 – 00;18;03;07

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

I talk with them about the risks of delaying because there is risk to delay. You know, you’re risking your child being potentially exposed to that illness, for a longer period of time. You know, if they can get that vaccine today in my office and you want to wait a month. Well, what if they get exposed to pertussis in a month?

 

00;18;03;07 – 00;18;30;01

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

You know what? If, you know, who knows what could happen? Especially with I mean, granted, with coronavirus, right now, we’re not traveling as much. But, you know, with travel and things like that, you know, polio could be just a plane flight away. So even though people don’t think about that, I talk to them about that. I talk to them about the fact that the more they come into my office, the more they’re exposing their child to viruses that I don’t have vaccines for in my office.

 

00;18;30;03 – 00;18;52;07

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

So I do talk about that. And, just, you know, obviously answer any questions. A lot of it is, oh, I saw this thing on social media about, you know, a friend of a friend of a friend that had this type of, side effect. And so then I try to explain the actual rate of side effects of vaccines and things like that.

 

00;18;52;07 – 00;18;53;12

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And so.

 

00;18;53;14 – 00;18;56;11

Dr. Mona

You know, and have you seen adverse side effects?

 

00;18;56;13 – 00;19;20;14

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Well, I mean, certainly we see fevers, you know, we see arm pain, things like that. I think we’ve had, you know, you get occasional like very rare, but occasional, syncope, which is when kids pass out, with some of the, like, adolescent vaccines. But in terms of any severe major side effect. No.

 

00;19;20;16 – 00;19;36;28

Dr. Mona

I have it, and I’m happy you’re saying that because I think, you know, there’s another misconception that we are hiding information like, we don’t know, like, meaning you guys are you guys are fine knowing these things are not telling the public. And that is so false because, I mean, obviously you’ve been practicing for 13 years. I’ve been practicing for five.

 

00;19;37;03 – 00;19;55;20

Dr. Mona

My colleagues that I work with, some of them, like I said, have been practicing for 40 plus years. So they and even the ones who’ve been practicing for 40 plus years are pro-vaccine. Because if we ever saw adverse side effects and saw, hey, why is this vaccine causing so many harmful things, do you think we’d actually want to get it right?

 

00;19;55;20 – 00;20;16;03

Dr. Mona

Like obviously not. These are tested things. That’s obviously coming onto the market after multiple multiple tests. But even so, like the common sense pediatrician loving pediatrician standard, if I for any at any moment saw something harmful in my patients and saw a trend, I would not be promoting it to my children. And we don’t write.

 

00;20;16;03 – 00;20;16;19

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Well, and.

 

00;20;16;19 – 00;20;17;20

Dr. Mona

We don’t see that there.

 

00;20;17;20 – 00;20;46;01

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Are regulatory bodies that follow vaccines. You know, I talked about the rotavirus vaccine. Well, there used to be a rotavirus vaccine before the one that’s out that we use now. And it was found that it caused an increased incidence of anticipation, which is a bowel disorder. And so that vaccine was pulled because they felt that after it got released and large numbers of infants were getting it, and they found there was elevated risk for, into the reception, they pulled it.

 

00;20;46;01 – 00;21;05;17

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

So, yeah, again, it’s if if a vaccine is found, just like you said, to have, terrible side effects, then they’re going to take it off the market. It’s not just like they throw it on the market and forget about it. These things are constantly studied and, and watched and all that kind of stuff.

 

00;21;05;17 – 00;21;25;01

Dr. Mona

So and you know, what’s happening a lot online and, you know, mom, I mommy groups, I used to be on zoom and I’ve left is a lot of anecdotal stories. Right. My child got a vaccine and then two days later got you know, a big, bad virus or got sick or had, for example, SIDs. I don’t know if you’ve heard this right.

 

00;21;25;03 – 00;21;27;25

Dr. Mona

Vaccine. There’s the vaccines cause.

 

00;21;27;28 – 00;21;31;02

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Which actually vaccines help prevent, prevent.

 

00;21;31;04 – 00;21;50;20

Dr. Mona

Exactly. So that vaccine causes SIDs and that is completely false. Like that is not that is not true. We don’t know the situation. We actually don’t even know if that’s a real story. You know. And that’s the scary part. And I’ve seen this happen. I’ve seen the stories be made up and and you can tell because as a physician, you can see holes in the story.

 

00;21;50;21 – 00;22;13;19

Dr. Mona

You can say that makes no sense. And that’s medically that’s not right. So this is not being written by a physician. This is not being written by a scientist. And it’s it’s terrifying because this is out there for people who we know mean well. And I think that gets me to my next point that I think sometimes vaccine hesitant or, you know, anti-vaccine families think that pediatricians it’s just going to be automatic butting of heads.

 

00;22;13;22 – 00;22;33;19

Dr. Mona

We’re not out to be angry. Like, that’s not what we want. We’re not coming in with guns blazing angry. We actually want to educate you, right? And we expect the same in return, to understand that we’re coming from a place of evidence based in my practice. I’m actually we also have a vaccine policy where you have to at least do a minimum expectation.

 

00;22;33;21 – 00;22;52;06

Dr. Mona

We don’t allow too much spacing also. We we do require some resemblance of the CDC schedule. Maybe if you want to do two and then come back a week later, but it can’t go like two, three months. And I do get vaccine hesitant families who are like, well, what do you think? I’m like, look. And we exactly what we talked about this episode so far.

 

00;22;52;09 – 00;23;05;29

Dr. Mona

But it’s just really important that they understand that we want to educate and we understand that you are also loving parents and you’re just trying to do the best for your kid. But we need to educate you on why this is the best for.

 

00;23;05;29 – 00;23;07;04

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Your child, right? Right.

 

00;23;07;04 – 00;23;32;07

Dr. Mona

You know. Yeah, it is. And that’s the hard part, because I feel like when it’s on, especially on social media and then in the office, more so on social because my office, they get it right. They know me, they know they know they’ve talked to me. They’re they really trust, you know, you’re when you’re in, in in the room with someone, it’s really much easier to have a heart to heart versus people yelling with capslock on on social media, which drives me nuts.

 

00;23;32;08 – 00;23;40;19

Dr. Mona

I’m like, you don’t please. Like I’m like, I will tell you. I’ll tell you all that’s right. We’ll talk about it. I just can’t get into it. In my DMs.

 

00;23;40;21 – 00;24;06;08

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Yeah. Well I mean I you know, you know I had a crazy time with some anti-vaxxers back in January and you know the, the funny thing to me, I mean I was so vilified and so you know everyone the, the comments that I was getting and like you know, and I have vaccine hesitant families all the time in my office.

 

00;24;06;08 – 00;24;26;15

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And it was interesting. They would they would come in after this whole thing happened and they’re like, I can’t believe all these people are saying these horrible things about you like you do. You talk to us about this and, they social media, they just can’t know you, right? They just make assumptions and, yeah, it’s it’s it’s a hard battle to fight.

 

00;24;26;17 – 00;24;46;26

Dr. Mona

Oh, it is. And, you know, obviously when we’re so busy in our real jobs. Right. Actually treating people, diagnosing multiple not, not not just vaccine preventable illnesses, but all the things that we, we do as general pediatricians. And then we take the time, like you do, out of your own time to go on social media to educate and empower parents, and then you get attacked there.

 

00;24;46;26 – 00;25;12;07

Dr. Mona

It’s actually I don’t think people really understand how annoying it is and how hurtful it is, because we’re doing this on our own free time and out of the goodness of our heart to educate you. And it’s coming from a place of love. It’s coming from a place of love, knowledge and just wanting to empower parents. And, you know, I’ve had my share of of stuff happen, obviously what what you went through was pretty, pretty rough.

 

00;25;12;09 – 00;25;29;04

Dr. Mona

Like, I remember talking about it after I mean, I was just it’s just uncalled for. And I’m so grateful that obviously your practice and everything got taken care of. And you actually, for anyone who doesn’t know, she became a hero. My call became like this back pro-vaccine hero in the way that we need to speak up about this.

 

00;25;29;04 – 00;25;44;20

Dr. Mona

You know, we need to share the stories and share why, how important it is. The one thing I wanted to kind of go back to was about vaccine schedules. And, do do you want to explain or you want me to, about why we recommend the schedule and why we don’t, why we don’t recommend spacing?

 

00;25;44;22 – 00;25;48;21

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

I mean, either one I don’t you can go for it. You do it. Yeah.

 

00;25;48;24 – 00;26;09;04

Dr. Mona

Well, I think you heard Nicole say that, it was obviously, we don’t want to keep you guys susceptible. Just so you start to space and you start to spaced three months. Four months, when it should be two months. We don’t want you to be susceptible to the illnesses at that in that time frame. And also the spacing is done because it’s studied that that is probably the best for immunity, right?

 

00;26;09;04 – 00;26;30;03

Dr. Mona

So you get the happy at a certain time, you get the DTaP at a certain time. It’s those schedules that are studied that say, hey, this is when vaccine or immunity is probably waning and we have to give a little booster. So the worry is that if you start to space, those those spaced schedules will are not study to know, are you actually having the same level of immunity.

 

00;26;30;05 – 00;26;47;22

Dr. Mona

So that like she said, puts you at risk of developing those illnesses because if you get exposed to someone but you were doing a spacing, we don’t know if that actually provides you the same level of immunity, even if you’ve had four doses in eight months versus the four doses you need and just say, you know, six months, whatever it is.

 

00;26;47;22 – 00;26;51;07

Dr. Mona

Right? That’s that’s the risky thing about spacing.

 

00;26;51;09 – 00;27;20;09

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And the vaccines are studied together. I think that people get, nervous about the number of vaccines, but they have been studied to be given together. Their immunity has been looked at, side effects have been looked at. I think the other thing that families don’t often think about. So a lot of us use combination vaccines. So like in my practice, we use a vaccine that is the DTaP, polio and Hib together, given at two, four and six months.

 

00;27;20;09 – 00;27;47;28

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And a lot of families. So when the, you know, it was initially that the MMR people thought it caused autism and they thought fine aerosol and all that kind of stuff. And then when that train got off, then they started blaming all the aluminum and everything else that’s in the vaccines. But if they’re spacing vaccines, they can actually be giving their children more, doses of aluminum or any other vaccine additives than if they were to get the combination vaccine.

 

00;27;47;28 – 00;28;05;16

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Because when you have the combination vaccine, there’s less aluminum in it than if you gave the DTaP, the polio and the Hib separate. So I just think families and that’s our job, that’s our job to educate them. And again, that’s why I ask them, what are your concerns? What are your questions. And if they’re one of their questions as well?

 

00;28;05;16 – 00;28;16;02

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

I heard that aluminum is bad. I can talk to them about that and tell them, you know, hey, why it’s not bad. And B, you know, you’re not getting a hefty dose of aluminum in these vaccines. So.

 

00;28;16;05 – 00;28;45;10

Dr. Mona

Right. And it’s it’s not bad because it’s the it’s a dose that’s safe in a vaccine. Right. Like it’s not I actually recorded another episode about food food science with food scientists talked about very similar to food that, you know, metals in baby food and the all the different components and all the different foods. If you ate 10,000 Cheerios in a day, probably poisoning because not and we joked about it, she’s like, not just from the cheerio, not the chemicals, but the Cheerios.

 

00;28;45;10 – 00;29;05;00

Dr. Mona

Right. Same thing. You’re not overdoing these things. This is all safe doses in a level that’s okay for our body to handle. And that’s why they’re studied for. I mean, they’re steady for a while, and, like, like Doctor Baldwin said, they’re studied. They’re monitored even when they’re on the market. And we would never want to give your kids these things.

 

00;29;05;00 – 00;29;19;08

Dr. Mona

And my son. Yeah, I’m still there vaccinating my child. And it’s not because someone’s telling me to because I’m a physician. It’s because I know it’s the right thing to do. Have you. So it sounds like you’ve been able to kind of get through to a lot of vaccine hesitant families, right?

 

00;29;19;10 – 00;29;59;28

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. I just had one the other day that, I just had a discussion with her because, she wanted to do a couple different vaccines, and I really recommended, that this child get the MMR, because my concern with the way the pandemic has gone and with some vaccine levels dropping and with the fact that we had this huge measles outbreak last year, you know, I told her, I just said, I’m I’m very concerned that I know you want to do these other vaccines, but I would really like you to consider getting the MMR today, because if there’s anything besides coronavirus and, you know, potentially flu coming back in the fall

 

00;30;00;00 – 00;30;14;13

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

that I worry about, I really worry about measles too. And, and mom chose to get the MMR because we talked about it and, and, and I’ve, you know, seen her kids for a while so that it’s just a matter of talking with people.

 

00;30;14;16 – 00;30;31;16

Dr. Mona

Oh, it is and it’s and, you know, if you are hesitant and obviously you’re listening, you’re still you’re still hesitant after this episode in any of the other, you know, vaccine episodes you listen to, talk to your pediatrician. But remember to go in with that open mind because you have to understand that we’re we’re also coming from.

 

00;30;31;16 – 00;30;51;25

Dr. Mona

Right. Obviously, the experiences we’ve had clinically obviously with the what we’ve studied as pediatricians. So understand that. And we are coming from a place of wanting to talk to you. We’re not going to come in saying you’re this and that. And I think and that’s why it hurts so much when you get that, that sort of energy, you’re like, already getting attacked.

 

00;30;51;25 – 00;31;10;10

Dr. Mona

I’m like, whoa, whoa, whoa. I don’t even I don’t even do anything. Yeah. Like, wow, why are we so angry at each other? I didn’t even say. And I didn’t even say that you were a bad parent. And yet they call me, you know, like I said, like a bad mom for wanting to vaccinate my unborn child. And it’s it’s just so, like I said, living in bizarro world that I’m like, what are we?

 

00;31;10;10 – 00;31;21;00

Dr. Mona

What are we talking about? Like, why are we sitting here and especially in the middle of a pandemic? Yeah. Talking about the how vaccines are bad when this is the world we’re living in without one vaccine.

 

00;31;21;00 – 00;31;26;27

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Right? Right, right. Yeah. And I, I think people are realizing that hopefully, I don’t know.

 

00;31;26;29 – 00;31;28;27

Dr. Mona

Yeah. It’s just they’re realizing it.

 

00;31;28;29 – 00;31;51;09

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And I would encourage parents that if they do have a pediatrician that is not talking with them, that is refusing to answer their questions, then explore a different pediatrician because you know that it is your child. And, you know, ultimately, as much as I, you know, obviously want the best for all of my patients, it’s ultimately the parent’s decision.

 

00;31;51;12 – 00;32;07;15

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

But if you have a pediatrician that is kind of refusing to answer your questions or refusing to talk with you, look to find a pediatrician that maybe is willing to talk, because most of us, I think, are, you know, you might get you might get a handful that aren’t, but most of us are like.

 

00;32;07;17 – 00;32;13;11

Dr. Mona

Oh, thank you so much, Nicole. What what would you say? What would be your final message for everyone listening?

 

00;32;13;14 – 00;32;38;17

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

My final message, besides vaccinate your kids? I would absolutely just say just no. And we’ve said it over and over again. But as pediatricians like, we love your kids, we are doing what we’re doing because we love your kids, because we want what’s best for your kids. We would not ever want to do anything that’s harmful, to your kids.

 

00;32;38;17 – 00;32;42;14

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

And, you know, that’s that’s what I would.

 

00;32;42;14 – 00;33;03;08

Dr. Mona

Say when I same. And I so appreciate you. I appreciate you again taking time. We’re recording some evening after work for both of us, I’m sure. So taking the time out of your day to do this with me, it’s so important. And obviously all the time you spend on all of the social media platforms you’re on. And I’m going to tag your Instagram on my show notes and, your other platforms as well.

 

00;33;03;10 – 00;33;25;06

Dr. Mona

So definitely follow her there because, again, a wealth of information. You are the first fellow pediatrician to be on my podcast, by the way. Wow. Yeah, I mean, I know pediatrician, I’ve obviously had other specialists, but I have a list of other pediatricians I want on. But when I decided to do this episode, you were the first one I thought of.

 

00;33;25;08 – 00;33;31;21

Dr. Mona

And I messaged you like a few months ago. I think. Yes. But, I really appreciate you and thank you so much again.

 

00;33;31;27 – 00;33;35;09

Dr. Nicole Baldwin

Oh thank you. It was great talking with you.

 

00;33;35;11 – 00;33;54;03

Dr. Mona

Thank you for tuning in for this week’s episode. I hope you guys enjoyed it. As always, please leave a review, share it with a friend, comment on my social media and if you’re not already, follow me at PedsDocTalk on Instagram. I love doing this for all of you. Have a great rest of your week! Take care.

 

00;33;54;04 – 00;33;54;29

Dr. Mona

Talk to you soon!