---
title: "How pediatricians build trust with vaccine-hesitant parents — a practice of last resort"
id: "stat-news-3-the-pediatricians-who-take-in-vaccine-skeptical-parents-others-won-t"
canonical_url: "https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/stat-news-3-the-pediatricians-who-take-in-vaccine-skeptical-parents-others-won-t"
content_type: "clinical_feed_article"
specialty: "Pediatrics"
source_name: "STAT News"
source_url: "https://www.statnews.com/2026/09/03/vaccine-hesitant-parents-how-pediatrician-builds-trust/?utm_campaign=rss"
published_at: "2026-09-03T08:30:00.000Z"
evidence_level: "Verified Feed"
license: "CC-BY-NC-4.0 / Informational Use"
---
# How pediatricians build trust with vaccine-hesitant parents — a practice of last resort
## Provenance & Clinical Metadata
- **Canonical URL:** https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/stat-news-3-the-pediatricians-who-take-in-vaccine-skeptical-parents-others-won-t
- **Specialty:** [Pediatrics](https://medichelpline.com/clinical-feed/pediatrics.md)
- **Primary Source:** STAT News
- **Source URL:** [Original Journal Publication](https://www.statnews.com/2026/09/03/vaccine-hesitant-parents-how-pediatrician-builds-trust/?utm_campaign=rss)
- **Published At:** 2026-09-03T08:30:00.000Z
- **Evidence Rating:** Verified Feed
## Executive GIST (TL;DR)
- Reporting focused on pediatricians who accept **vaccine-hesitant parents** that other practices decline; the piece profiles a clinic described as a “practice of last resort.” - The reporter, Eric Boodman, interviewed nine pediatricians across six states and shadowed one physician, **Aaron Bornstein**, during a meet-and-greet with a vaccine-hesitant parent. - The visiting parent said she trusted her prior pediatricians for routine newborn care but objected to firm clinic policies that she felt pressured her to vaccinate on the standard schedule. - The parent described prior clinicians as kind and competent but worried about rigid statements such as “she needs them all by 2 or we can’t keep her as a patient,” which prompted her to seek an alternative practice. - At the appointment at **Middleboro Pediatrics**, the encounter was framed as mutual evaluation: the parent assessing the doctor’s willingness to listen without judgment and the physician assessing how open the parent might be to medical advice if her child became a patient. - The article situates these clinical interactions in reporting about the fallout from federal messaging on **vaccines**, which the reporter explored by interviewing clinicians and observing practice-level encounters. - The report emphasizes relational dynamics — listening, allaying concerns, and avoiding hardline dismissals — as central to how this clinic engages families who are wary of mainstream vaccine protocols. - Specific operational details about the clinic’s policies, longitudinal outcomes for patients, and broader statistical data were not reported in the provided source excerpt.
## Clinical Analysis & Structured Key Points
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Test your knowledge with our new weekday mini crossword [ Start solving ](https://www.statnews.com/stat-mini-crossword/) ![An illustration depicting a doctor unraveling a string around a syringe, while a mother holds the other end of the string while holding her newborn.](https://www.statnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Vaccine_Hesitancy-645x645.jpg) Natsumi Chikayasu for STAT [Trust in Science](https://www.statnews.com/category/trust-in-science/) # The pediatricians who take in vaccine-skeptical parents others won’t ## At a ‘practice of last resort,’ doctors prioritize allaying concerns without hardline dismissals * * * By [Eric Boodman](https://www.statnews.com/staff/eric-boodman/) Sept. 3, 2026 In his reporting on the fallout from federal messaging on vaccines, Boodman interviewed nine pediatricians in six states and spent a day shadowing Aaron Bornstein during a meet-and-greet with a vaccine-hesitant parent. ![](https://www.statnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/eric-b-avatar-small2-80x80.png) [Eric Boodman](https://www.statnews.com/staff/eric-boodman/) 1. [](https://x.com/ericboodman "X") eric.boodman@statnews.com Eric Boodman focuses on narrative features, exploring the startling ways that science and medicine affect people’s lives. You can reach Eric on Signal at eboodman.88. [Get email alerts for Eric BoodmanSigned up for email alertsRemove email alerts](https://www.statnews.com/2026/09/03/vaccine-hesitant-parents-how-pediatrician-builds-trust/?utm_campaign=rss) [Subscribe](https://www.statnews.com/stat-plus/) or [log in](https://www.statnews.com/login/) to STAT+ to unlock email alerts * [Manage alerts for this article](https://www.statnews.com/my-account/edit/#emails) * Email this article * [Share this article](https://www.statnews.com/2026/09/03/vaccine-hesitant-parents-how-pediatrician-builds-trust/?utm_campaign=rss) LLAKEVILLE, Mass. — She didn’t have any trouble with her current pediatricians in Fall River. Really, she didn’t. She liked them. They were kind. They were great with her newborn daughter. They had helpful answers to most of her new-mom questions. “My only issue was the vaccines. They push ’em,” she said, rocking her 6-week-old’s carrier. “They’re like, ‘Well, she needs them all by 2 or we can’t keep her as a patient. And I’m like, ‘OK, I understand that, but at the same time, like, why?’ And they’re like, ‘It’s our protocol.’” Advertisement That wasn’t a good enough answer for her, and that was why she was here at Middleboro Pediatrics at 4:45 p.m. on a hot summer Thursday, meeting a new doctor named Aaron Bornstein. In a sense, they were auditioning each other. She was testing his willingness to take her questions and concerns seriously, without judgment or sneering — to “work with her,” as this sort of flexibility is often called in this genre of conversation between someone who represents medical authority and someone else who’s wary of it. He, meanwhile, was probing just how wary of his medical advice she might be if her daughter became his patient. 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