Study on adverse event following COVID 19 vaccination at tertiary care hospital, Karwars

Abstract

Introduction: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) as pandemic has caused massive crisis to global public health and also has turned into global economic devastation. In India, regulatory authorities had given permission for two vaccines. Covaxin, an inactivated vaccine developed and manufactured by Bharat Biotech and Covishield, the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine is being manufactured locally by Serum Institute of India. Aim: The present study has been proposed against this backdrop with the aim to study the adverse drug event post vaccination at our vaccination center and to compare the adverse drug event post first and second dose of COVID-19 vaccinations. Material and Methods: This is a cross-sectional study done among the health care professionals and Students of Karwar institute of medical sciences, Karwar, Karnataka. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed amongst the participants. Results: Out of 766 participants, 672 individuals received Covishield vaccine, 79 participants received Covaxin. Among the total participants, 665 had received both the doses of vaccines, 97 had received only the 1 st dose. The most common adverse event at the injection site was pain/tenderness and apart from injection site, the commonest adverse event documented was fever. Conclusion: As the study site is an Adverse drug monitoring center (AMC), higher reporting rate of Adverse effect following immunization (AEFI) was noted. The adverse events noted were not of serious nature and there was significant reduction in Adverse event (AE) for both the vaccines following 2nd dose across all age groups, in both the gender and for all adverse event except diarrhea, indicating that the vaccine used in India are safe.

Keywords

• adverse event
• adverse effect following immunization
• coronavirus disease 2019
• covaxin
• covishield