Pneumococcal Vaccine Helps Prevent Kids' Ear Infections

Mar. 23 -- MONDAY, April 2 (HealthDay News) -- While the primary reason for vaccinating children against pneumococcal disease is to guard them against serious diseases such as meningitis and pneumonia, an added benefit of the vaccine is that it cuts down on chronic ear infections and the need for ear-tube surgery.

Recent research suggests that when infants and young children receive the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine and the recommended booster shots, the incidence of frequent ear infections may decline by as much as 28 percent. The need for the surgical insertion of pressure-equalizing tubes in the ears went down by as much as 23 percent.

"The pneumococcal conjugate vaccine has been very successful in combating serious infections in children and is also giving benefits in terms of reducing ear infections and the need for tube surgery," said Dr. Katherine Poehling, a pediatrician at Brenner Children's Hospital at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.

Results of the study are published in the April issue of Pediatrics. The research was conducted while Poehling was working at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn.

Different strains of the bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae are responsible for causing numerous serious illnesses, such as meningitis, some types of pneumonia and the blood infection, bacteremia. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), pneumococcal diseases are responsible for the deaths of about 200 children under the age of 5 in the United States each year.

S. pneumoniae is also a major cause of ear infections.

In 2000, a pneumococcal vaccine became commercially available for children under 2. Sold under the brand name, Prevnar, the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine was soon incorporated into the routine immunization schedule. It's recommended that infants receive four doses of the vaccine: at 2 months, 4 months, 6 months and the final shot at 12 to 15 months of age, according to the CDC.