Immunisations are used to stimulate your body’s natural defences to try and reduce the chance of you catching certain infections. If you’ve had certain types of cancer or cancer treatments, you might not be able to have some of the vaccinations that you need to travel to some parts of the world.
The type of vaccinations you need for your holiday will depend on where you are going, so this might make a difference to where you decide to go. Your travel agent can let you know and then you can discuss it further with your doctor.
live vaccines
These include measles, mumps, rubella and MMR, poliomyelitis liquid, liquid typhoid, BCG and yellow fever.
If you have a weakened immune system, you should not have live vaccines. You can have a weakened immune system if you’ve had chemo, total body radiotherapy or a stem cell or bone marrow transplant within the last 6 months. Steroid therapy can weaken your immunity for 3 months.
If you’ve had a lymphoma or leukaemia, or if your cancer is related to HIV infection, you may always need to avoid having live vaccines.
inactivated vaccines
These include: tetanus, poliomyelitis injection, whooping cough, hepatitis A, meningococcal meningitis, hepatitis B, rabies and cholera.
Although inactivated viruses are safe to give after cancer treatment, they may be less effective in people who have a weakened immune system.
spleen removal
If you have had your spleen removed, you will have a lowered resistance to certain types of infection. In particular, malaria can be severe if you’ve had your spleen removed. If you’re travelling to countries where malaria is a problem, it’s essential to have protection, so you need to take advice about this before you travel.
