Where To Locate Your Personal Vaccination Records

Your vaccination records include a detailed history of all vaccines you received as a child through adulthood. There are a few places to look if you need these records for any reason.

You know you’ve gotten a number of vaccinations but you have no idea where all of those records are stored—now what? You might want access to these records for your own knowledge, but also a history of vaccinations are commonly required for certain jobs, school registration or when traveling to a foreign country.

Life would be easier if there were a national organization in charge of storing and maintaining these records but unfortunately that’s not the case. The CDC is not responsible for maintaining this information. Accessing your personal immunization records requires some digging and often in multiple locations. 

Where To Look When Searching For Personal Immunization Records

1. Start with your parents or childhood caregiver to see if they have your immunizations records filled away somewhere. At the time of receiving any vaccine you or your parents were given a record, which was yours to keep and file away for future use. If they shrug their shoulders and have no idea we recommend hunting through baby books or other boxes that contain saved mementoes from your childhood.
2. Give your old school(s) a call to see if they still have immunization records from previous students. The only downside to this is that most schools only keep records for students 1-2 years after they graduate. It’s still always worth calling to find out though. 
3. Contact previous places of employment that have required immunizations to see if they still have them on file anywhere.
4. Call the doctor or public health clinic that administered vaccinations to see if they have a copy. Medical institutions typically keep records longer than schools but may have a cap on the number years they keep old records in the system.
5. Get in touch with your state’s health department to see if they maintain Immunization Information Systems.

Help! I Can’t Locate My Records Anywhere

If you’ve called everywhere you can think of and searched high and low and still can’t find your immunization records what should you do? In some cases, a doctor may conduct a blood test to check your immunity and see what vaccinations you have received. Worst-case scenario you may need to get some vaccines again, this is perfectly safe and it’s better to be overly cautious than to assume you’ve already been vaccinated without documented proof. 

Tips To Prevent Losing Vaccination Records In The Future

It is important to keep an ongoing record of vaccines received all throughout life. Vaccines are vital to protecting you and those around you from serious illness and even death. Even if you received all vaccines as a child you may require additional vaccines as an adult, either due to age, lifestyle, job, travel or health conditions. All of these vaccines should be recorded and carefully filled away so that you can access them as needed in the future.

It can take a lot of time and effort to locate old immunization records. People move more than ever these days, making it even more challenging of a task. The best way to prevent this issue in the future is to keep close tabs on all immunizations, either filled away somewhere safe at home or scanned and stored on a computer hard drive.

When you go in for new vaccinations ask the health care provider or pharmacy for an immunization record form. You can also print out your own form here: http://www.floridahealth.gov/programs-and-services/immunization/_documents/dh-680-sample.pdf 

Bring this with you to future vaccinations, always asking the provider to sign off on the same paper. This keeps all of your records in one place. (Reference)