Vaccination history in Russia

[Hollyday 122]

LOL, that's funny, but actually almost every Russian (with rare exeptions) has easy recognisable mark on the shoulder, it's variola vaccination. I don't know why, but that vaccine they used in USSR and Russia always leaves a scar. I have one too.

- Victor from Russia

I don't have one!

[Meghan&Andrey 51]

LOL, that's funny, but actually almost every Russian (with rare exeptions) has easy recognisable mark on the shoulder, it's variola vaccination. I don't know why, but that vaccine they used in USSR and Russia always leaves a scar. I have one too.

- Victor from Russia

Yeah, I don't know why he kept saying hand. I did see the scar on his arm when we were in Turkey. He was showing me for some reason I can't remember. But I just got so frustrated at his thinking a mark on the arm was sufficient evidence of vaccinations to the US government. Like, really...? He has this attitude with all kinds of things. It took two weeks for him to finally go get his darn picture taken. He insisted he could do it himself & didn't care what the specifications said for it. He knew best. This man has tested my patience more than anything! Gotta love him. Russians..lol

[Snipe 21]

That scar is called the third world country scar by most because depending on technology used to do that vaccination, it leaves a bigger scar. some friends from pakistan have a bigger mark than say other from Mexico that has a smaller pne or russians.

I am pretty sure that I read somewhere that a scar lile that along woth a written statement along with some dr. sgnature can be used as evidence for a vacinnation. but seems complicated.

btw my wife didnt trust local clinic and went to private for vacination and paid about $50-70 a piece. still she said she read somwhere embassy charges 100 per each!

[Amy_and_Victor 159]

btw my wife didnt trust local clinic and went to private for vacination and paid about $50-70 a piece. still she said she read somwhere embassy charges 100 per each!

I don't have official information, but last year I read on some forum that they actually charge about $60 per shot. Not sure if it's still the same, I've heard they raised exam prices last fall. I still did mine in local clinic for free except influenza (they didn't get vaccine on time so I went to private clinic that already had a vaccine).

- Victor from Russia

[Meghan&Andrey 51]

That scar is called the third world country scar by most because depending on technology used to do that vaccination, it leaves a bigger scar. some friends from pakistan have a bigger mark than say other from Mexico that has a smaller pne or russians.

I am pretty sure that I read somewhere that a scar lile that along woth a written statement along with some dr. sgnature can be used as evidence for a vacinnation. but seems complicated.

btw my wife didnt trust local clinic and went to private for vacination and paid about $50-70 a piece. still she said she read somwhere embassy charges 100 per each!

So I'm thinking I'm going to send him to a local clinic & see if they either can test for the vaccines & show the history, give him the new ones, or create something for him that says around when he would have had those (I've read that people have done this because they get these as babies & in school regularly like we do) but I'm not sure. Do they have to have all of the ones on that list?

• Hepatitis A
• Hepatitis B
• Influenza
• Influenza type b (Hib)
• Measles
• Meningococcal
• Mumps
• Pneumococcal
• Pertussis
• Polio
• Rotavirus
• Rubella
• Tetanus and diphtheria toxoids
• Varicella

[kefir10 3]

As far as I know, Influenza and Varicella are not part of the vaccination schedule there (if he had chicken pox as a child, then varicella wouldn't be necessary).

[Meghan&Andrey 51]

As far as I know, Influenza and Varicella are not part of the vaccination schedule there (if he had chicken pox as a child, then varicella wouldn't be necessary).

I found this on the Moscow embassy site that gives a schedule of when the vaccines were supposed to be administered.

http://moscow.usembassy.gov/vac_schedule.html

However, meningoccal & rotavirus weren't listed. I needed Russian translations to give to my fiancé' to tell the doctor which vaccines needed to be listed on the document to take to the medical exam. This is turning out to be quite tedious.

He did find his medical booklet that has vaccinations listed, but he says he could only make out 3 of them because the doctor's writing was so awful.

[Amy_and_Victor 159]

As far as I know, Influenza and Varicella are not part of the vaccination schedule there (if he had chicken pox as a child, then varicella wouldn't be necessary).

Influenza is reqired if you're going to interview during fall/winter flu season, I don't remember what months exactly embassy considering as a flu season.

Varicella actually was reqired when I was going to medical exam so unless they changed it you still need to have it, but since I had Varicella in childhood, I made a test for immunity in advance and brought test results to IOM where I was passing exam.

[vbtwo 54]

Yes, flu is required from around Oct-Mar or so. Varicella is required unless you had it and then they mark varicella history checkbox on the form and that's it.

For my fiancee, they only wrote in Td and MMR shots (she had separate shots for each one, not one combined shot like they do in the US) when she went in for her medical. She had chickenpox, so they checked the VH box. It wasn't flu season, so no flu shot needed. Everything else they checked off as "not age appropriate". We had no problems.

Edited May 2, 2014 by vbtwo

[Hollyday 122]

So i had my medical today: an oral statement of having had chicken pox was perfectly sufficient to avoid a vaccination. Everything else was documented though in this vaccination statement.

[Snipe 21]

Thanks for sharing. Good to know this is possible to do))

By the way my wife wanted me to ask you what you saw in regards to the Tuberculosos exams. She read in some blog that a lot of people are gettimg false positives. did you see snyone with that and how was that?

thanks and good luck in interview!

So i had my medical today: an oral statement of having had chicken pox was perfectly sufficient to avoid a vaccination. Everything else was documented though in this vaccination statement.

[Hollyday 122]

Thanks for sharing. Good to know this is possible to do))

By the way my wife wanted me to ask you what you saw in regards to the Tuberculosos exams. She read in some blog that a lot of people are gettimg false positives. did you see snyone with that and how was that?

thanks and good luck in interview!

Thanks!

I didn't see anything about this unfortunately: they told me to come for results after 2 pm, i came at quarter to, and almost everyone else had got their results by that time so i didn't see what was happening to anyone else. People who were still there seemed to be okay.

[Snipe 21]

That's good that you are able to get your medical exam results the same day. And good to know that there was no drama about that TB test.

[Hollyday 122]

That's good that you are able to get your medical exam results the same day. And good to know that there was no drama about that TB test.

To get the results on the same day you have to schedule the starting point of this whole thing till 10 am (between 8:30 and 10). If one's scheduled between 10 and 1pm, then the results are available next day. I think it's probably because of the blood test.

[Meghan&Andrey 51]

My fiancé is going to his doctor on Monday. Can y'all confirm for me that he will be okay just getting his doctor to create a letter stating he's had those vaccinations since he doesn't have one document that shows all of them? The doctor doing the medical exam for the embassy will accept this?