Natural Ways to Prepare Your Child for Vaccinations

Some of the most frequent questions I get as a Pediatrician are about vaccines. We have a very conscious and thoughtful parent population here at Mindful Pediatrics. The most common concerns voiced by these parents are around how to protect their children from the known toxins in immunizations, as well as ways they can help mitigate vaccine side effects.  

Unfortunately, there is very little research on the use of natural remedies to prevent side effects or complications from vaccines. I do, however, believe that there are some basic measures we can take to improve our overall health and wellbeing. Generally speaking, the stronger we are, the more resilient we are.

Vaccine Tolerance & Timing

In nearly twenty years as a Pediatrician, I have observed that healthy children seem to have less side effects and tolerate vaccines (and illness in general) better than those children with ongoing acute or chronic medical issues.

Although the American Academy of Pediatrics and CDC recommend avoiding vaccines only with serious illness, I recommend vaccinating your child only if they are completely healthy.

For most children, this simply means waiting a week or two after recovering from an acute illness, such as a cold or tummy bug.

For children with complicated or chronic health conditions, it can be more challenging to assess the risk/reward ratio of vaccination. That’s where we come in. I recommend setting up an appointment so that we can discuss what makes the most sense for your child.

Build a Strong Foundation

Before we get into the specifics of this post, I always recommend starting with the foundation of a healthy diet and lifestyle. If your children are not taking any supplements, please start with a Multivitamin, Omega 3’s, Probiotics and Vitamin D3. You can consider our Foundational Four Supplements as a complement to your healthy diet and lifestyle, to help ensure that all nutritional needs are being adequately met.

Supplemental Vaccine & Immune Support

In general, I support my patients who are receiving vaccines with remedies that would assist a viral or bacterial infection. We are not trying to suppress the immune response. We want our bodies to create protective antibodies, efficiently and safely. Because of this, I prefer to use conservative but effective doses so as to not overload the body unnecessarily.

For 5 days before & 7 days after vaccination, I suggest adding the following supplements:

Immune Support

A combination of herbs and mushrooms that assist the immune system by supporting natural killer (NK) cell activity, cytokine synthesis, and the T-cell and B-cell mediated responses.

Vitamin C

The well document benefits of vitamin C are too numerous to list here, but this vitamin is a very cost-effective way to support inflammation, detoxification and proper immune function.

Zinc

Zinc deficiency is very common in the hundreds of patients we have tested. Zinc is a major player for rapidly dividing cells like our immune system and there are studies that support the effectiveness of zinc in improving immune response to vaccines. 

Liposomal Glutathione

Glutathione is a master anti-inflammatory and detoxification compound in the body, especially the nervous system. While we have ensured that none of our vaccines contain mercury at Mindful Pediatrics, studies have even shown the protective effect of glutathione on the toxicity of Thimerosal (mercury).

I have put my favorite products together into a Pre & Post Vaccination Support Kit. This protocol is suitable for both children and adults. For children, our age-appropriate dosing recommendations will be listed within the kit when you view the supplements or purchase them.

Be well,
Dr. Roy