Evaluation of the Cold Chain Expanded Program on Immunization at Governmental and Private Health Care Centers in Riyadh City, Saudi Arabia

Objective: Vaccine storage is essential to ensure optimal vaccine effectiveness. Cold chain is a series of storage and transport links, designed to keep the vaccine at the correct temperature till it reaches the user. To evaluate the Cold Chain Expanded Program on Immunization at Governmental and Private Health Care Centers in Riyadh city, Saudi Arabia.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted from March to May 2021 in government and private primary health care centers of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia were included. Data collection was carried out using standardized check list developed by Saudi Ministry of Health (MOH) and World Health Organization (WHO). Data were analysed using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 (C) and IBM SPSS 26 (IBM Inc.)

Results: The results showed that the mean score of Room and Refrigerator Elements for governmental PHCs was 8.8(±0.82), while it was 8.3(±1.86) for private PHCs. The mean temperature monitoring device score for government PHCs was 4.0 (0.0), and the 3.65 (±0.92) for PHCs centers. The mean temperature chart (record keeping) score for governmental PHCs was 2.55(±0.5) and 1.8(±1.2) for private PHCs. The mean maintenance and operations score for governmental PHCs was 4.6 (±0.49), while it was 4.1 (±0.84) for private PHCs. The mean scores of all cold chain components differed significantly between government and private facilities (p=0.000).

Conclusion: Our study highlights the cold chain management programs Saudi Arabia. More importantly governmental PHC centers in the current settings comply with the standards to the guidelines, provided by Saudi Ministry of Health and WHO, was observed, in comparison to private PHC centers.