Vaccine reasonable adjustments

Reasonable adjustments are small changes that can help people with a learning disability be treated equally.

You can find out about reasonable adjustments on our reasonable adjustments webpage.

If you are going for a vaccine appointment, here are some extra reasonable adjustments that you might want to ask for.

If you find waiting for your appointment hard, ask if you can have your vaccine early in the morning or at the end of the day.

If you don’t like noisy places, bring some headphones with you to listen to music.

If you find it hard to wait in a busy area, ask if they have a quiet room you can wait in before and after the vaccine.

You might want to bring something with you that makes you feel relaxed.  For example a stress ball.

Let the nurse know if you do not like needles, or are afraid of them.  This is sometimes called needle phobia.

The nurse might have some ideas on how to make you feel more relaxed.

You can have some vaccines, like the flu vaccine, in a nose spray. At the moment, you can not have the coronavirus vaccine in a nose spray.

If you don’t want to feel the needle, ask if the nurse can put some numbing cream on your arm.

If you are afraid of needles, ask them to hide the needle when you come in so you don’t see it.

Or you could ask if they could put a screen around your arm so you don’t see the needle.

You might find it helpful to play a game or listen to some music on your iPad or mobile phone to help distract you.