Doctors give H1N1 vaccines to ailing kids

Doctors came through with H1N1 flu vaccines Thursday for some ailing children whose desperate parents had been unable to get the shots.

Moved by the children's plight, an office manager for a clinic in Schaumburg offered to give vaccinations to two children highlighted in a Daily Herald story Thursday.

Parents of 7-year-old Rachel Williams of Algonquin, recovering from leukemia, and 8-year-old Jenevieve Duczman of Schaumburg, who has cerebral palsy and lung problems, made arrangements with the clinic to get the shots.

"That's awesome for them to do that," Jenevieve's mother Joan Duczman said. "I'm so relieved."

But the clinic has just received such a limited quantity of vaccines, the office manager did not want it to be identified yet.

At the same time, Dr. Syed Quadri of Elgin volunteered to take care of another ill child who needs the vaccine.

Five-year-old Matea Seely of West Chicago was born with congenital emphysema, and had surgery to remove part of her lungs when she was newborn and again this May. Her mother, Diane Duarte, had been frantically trying to get a vaccine.

After hearing that the vaccine is being distributed without enforcing the priority groups who are supposed to get it first, Duarte said, "They're giving it to anybody and everybody. They really need to define how they're going to give it to people who need it right away."

Quadri agreed, saying it would be better to have doctors give the vaccinations, because they have records of which patients have other medical conditions that make them a priority for receiving the shot.

His was one of the few doctors' offices in the suburbs to get the vaccine, he believes, because his manager, Sandy Miscevich, ordered it as soon as possible directly from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, rather than going through the Illinois Department of Public Health.

Originally, health officials had planned on doctors and pharmacies giving most of the vaccinations, while public health clinics would supplement them for people who don't have doctors or insurance.

But nationwide delays occurred in manufacturing the vaccine through an antiquated method of growing them in chicken eggs.

The delays created shortages so that county health departments and hospitals have gotten small supplies of vaccines, but most doctors and pharmacies are still waiting.