The considerable diversity of HIV worldwide represents a critical challenge for designing an effective HIV vaccine. Now a scientific team led by Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center shows that mosaic antigens might overcome this challenge.
There is an association between the influenza virus and cardiovascular events like heart disease and stroke; those with cardiovascular disease should protect themselves against the flu.
Receiving an influenza vaccination was associated with a lower risk of major adverse cardiovascular events such as heart failure or hospitalization for heart attack, with the greatest treatment effect seen among patients with recent acute coronary syndrome (ACS; such as heart attack or unstable angina), according to a meta-analysis published in the October 23/30 issue of JAMA.
The flu vaccine may not only ward off serious complications from influenza, it may also reduce the risk of heart attack or stroke by more than 50 per cent among those who have had a heart attack, according to new research led by Dr. Jacob Udell, a cardiologist at Women’s College Hospital and clinician-scientist at the University of Toronto.
A Mayo Clinic physician and two other pediatric experts say that parental perceptions pose a major barrier to acceptance of human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination — and that many of those perceptions are wrong.
A study led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists highlights a new approach for developing a universal influenza vaccine that could protect against multiple flu strains, including deadly pandemic strains. The research appears today in the advance online edition of the scientific journal Nature Immunology.
Suspicions about sexual promiscuity and vaccine safety are explored in an article in the November issue of the journal Preventive Medicine, which dedicates a section of that issue to research concerning the human papillomavirus.
First step taken in collection of data on vaccine-preventable illnesses in patients with myasthenia gravis, a neuromuscular disorder causing weakness and rapid fatigue of voluntary muscles.
Healthcare providers say that older teens often go to the doctor without a parent who can provide consent for needed vaccinations, finds a new study in the Journal of Adolescent Health.
In a recent study published in Science Translational Medicine, the Irvine lab showed how formulation of protein or peptide vaccines in lipid nanocapsules makes them much more durable inside the body and protects the vaccine content long enough to generate a strong immune response at mucosal surfaces. The nanoparticle packaging enhances the efficacy of vaccines designed to block respiratory infection in the lungs or infection at other mucosal sites such as the gastrointestinal and reproductive tracts. In addition, the particles show promise for the delivery of therapeutic cancer vaccines, which stimulate the body’s own immune system to destroy tumors.
The new vaccine was developed to act as a booster to Bacille Calmette Guerin (BCG), currently the only TB vaccine available. BCG was developed in the 1920s and has been used worldwide. The new “booster” would reactivate immune elements that over time diminish following BCG vaccination.
All children should have flu shots, even if they have an egg allergy, and it’s now safe to get them without special precautions. “In a large number of research studies published over the last several years, thousands of egg allergic children, including those with a severe life-threatening reaction to eating eggs, have received injectable influenza vaccine (IIV) as a single dose without a reaction” said allergist John Kelso, MD, fellow of the ACAAI.
Researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Boston University, in collaboration with the American Academy of Allergy Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI), have found evidence of the H1N1 influenza vaccine’s safety during pregnancy.
Researchers at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) discovered that an antibody that binds and neutralizes HIV likely also targets the body’s own “self” proteins. This finding could complicate the development of HIV vaccines designed to elicit this protective antibody, called 4E10, and others like it, as doing so might be dangerous or inefficient.
Saint Louis University’s Center for Vaccine Development is one of eight institutions funded by the NIH to study a vaccine for a lethal strain of bird flu.
Medical and health experts from Indiana University discuss progress in genital herpes treatment and a new source of credible information about drug and alcohol trends.
Some of this year's flu vaccine will protect against four strains of the virus. There will also be vaccines which protect against three strains of the virus as well. This is the first year the four strain flu vaccine is available.
You may not know the human metapneumovirus by name, but chances are that you have met somewhere before. HMPV, as it's known to virologists, is a common respiratory virus that new studies suggest is second only to influenza in the number of viral pneumonia cases it causes worldwide every year. Especially dangerous for small children, the elderly, and anyone with a compromised immune system, the virus strikes almost 100 percent of people on Earth at some point in their lives.
By tracking the previously unknown movements of a set of specialized cells, Whitehead Institute scientists are shedding new light on how the immune system mounts a successful defense against hostile, ever-changing invaders.
Dana-Farber scientists report in the Journal of Clinical Investigation they have developed a tumor vaccine based on the patient’s tumor to create a strong and selective immune response in some chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients.
The study, formally titled, “Optimal Germinal Center B Cell Activation and T-Dependent Antibody Responses Require Expression of the Mouse Complement Receptor Cr1” used a mouse model system to examine receptors on a select set of cells that centralize antigens in sites of high immune activity, which are substances that cause a person’s immune system to produce antibodies.
Among their discoveries was a finding that cells that are central to organizing the centers for B cells (which are antibody-producing cells) express a receptor called Cr1 when undergoing processes to make antibodies.
Mark Martens, M.D., chief of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Jersey Shore University Medical Center, announces that the hospital is participating in a clinical study to evaluate the safety, immunogenicity and efficacy of an investigational vaccine for the prevention of primary symptomatic Clostridium difficile infection (CDI). Clostridium difficile (C. diff) is a potentially life-threatening, spore-forming bacterium that causes intestinal disease. While most types of health care-associated infections (HAIs) are declining, C. diff is emerging as a leading cause of life-threatening, HAIs worldwide.
Improving vaccination rates against the human papillomavirus (HPV) in boys is key to protecting both men and women, says new research from University of Toronto Professor Peter A. Newman from the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work.
HPV has been linked to anal, penile and certain types of throat cancers in men. Since the virus is also responsible for various cancers in women, vaccinating boys aged 11 to 21 will play a crucial role in reducing cancer rates across the sexes.
A team of researchers led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, CA has developed a strategy for inducing a key part of an effective immune response to HIV.
At a talk at the American Crystallographic Association meeting in Hawaii, the team will present multiple crystal structures, which like detailed architectural blueprints show how the virus interacts with components of the immune system.
Using an Electronic Health Record (EHR) system to automate the immunization data shared between health providers and public health agencies enables physicians to assist individual patients faster and more effectively, while also providing more immediate, cohesive community data to the agencies tasked with promoting public health. Those are the findings of a new study conducted by researchers from Columbia University School of Nursing and partner institutions. The researchers also found that automated reporting reduced the lag time historically associated with data submitted on vaccinations and, in some cases, reduced the paperwork and staff time traditionally devoted to managing these required submissions.
The next flu shot season will include several new vaccine options for consumers, Mayo Clinic vaccine expert Gregory Poland, M.D., says. Fearful of needles? There’s now an influenza vaccination just for you. Allergic to eggs? It won’t stop you from getting a flu shot. The new choices move influenza vaccinations closer to the personalized approach long sought by immunologists including Dr. Poland, but they may also prove bewildering to patients, he says.
Children who receive a vaccine to prevent blood and ear infections, appear to be reducing the spread of pneumonia to the rest of the population, especially their grandparents and other older adults.
Increased concerns about the perceived risk of vaccination, inconvenience, or religious tenets are leading more U.S. parents to opt-out of vaccinating their children. Parents are increasingly able to do so in states that have relatively simple procedures for immunization exemption, report researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center in the July issue of Health Affairs. Some states, fearing a public health crisis, have responded by putting in place more burdensome procedures for parents of school-aged children to opt-out.
Using a data set spanning 40 years of dengue fever incidence in Thailand, an international team has for the first time estimated from data that after an initial infection, a person is protected from infection with other strains for between one and three years, promising more effective vaccine studies.
Using two-dimensional barcodes on vaccine product labels would enhance the safety of the U.S. immunization system and save more than $300 million by 2023, according to a study by researchers at RTI International and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention.
A new phase I study at Roswell Park Cancer Institute will test the safety and efficacy of a new immunotherapy vaccine for treatment of advanced melanoma.
Mayo Clinic and other researchers have shown that a vaccine given to newborns is at least 60 percent effective against rotavirus in Ghana. Rotavirus causes fever, vomiting and diarrhea, which in infants can cause severe dehydration. In developed nations, the condition often results in an emergency room visit or an occasional hospitalization, but is rarely fatal. In developing countries, however, rotavirus-related illness causes approximately 500,000 deaths per year. The findings appear this week in the Journal of Infectious Diseases.
A new University of Michigan poll shows that 61 percent of adults say they don’t know when they were last vaccinated against pertussis, which could mean they might be unwittingly exposing vulnerable babies to the disease.
A team of Johns Hopkins researchers working with animals has developed a vaccine that prevents the virulent TB bacterium from invading the brain and causing the highly lethal condition TB meningitis, a disease that disproportionately occurs in TB-infected children and in adults with compromised immune system.
In its fourth year with 99 percent compliance, Loyola University Health System's mandatory flu shot program is the subject of a study presented by Jorge Parada, MD, Loyola University Health System, presented at an infectious disease conference.
The Human papillomavirus, or HPV, and its link to certain cancers has been in the headlines recently, reigniting the debate whether it is appropriate to vaccinate children against the virus. Robert Haddad, MD, the disease center lead at Dana-Farber's head and neck oncology program offers comment.
The bacteria that live in the human gut may play an important role in immune response to vaccines and infection by wild-type enteric organisms, according to two recent studies from researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine
Researchers have developed a new gene therapy to thwart a potential influenza pandemic. They demonstrated that a single dose of an adeno-associated virus expressing a broadly neutralizing flu antibody into the noses of animal models gives them complete protection and substantial reductions in flu replication when exposed to lethal strains of H5N1 and H1N1 flu virus. These were isolated from samples associated from historic human pandemics – the infamous 1918 flu pandemic and another from 2009.
An attack on glioblastoma brain tumor cells that uses a modified poliovirus is showing encouraging results in an early study to establish the proper dose level, researchers at Duke Cancer Institute report.
Whooping cough has exploded in the United States and some other developed countries in recent decades, and many experts suspect ineffective childhood vaccines for the alarming resurgence.
The results of a phase 1/2 clinical trial in Europe of an investigational Lyme disease vaccine co-developed by researchers at Stony Brook University, Brookhaven National Laboratory, and at Baxter International Inc., a U.S. based healthcare company, revealed it to be promising and well tolerated, according to a research paper published online in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. The vaccine was shown to produce substantial antibodies against all targeted species of Borrelia, the causative agent of Lyme disease in Europe and the United States. Baxter International conducted the clinical trial of the vaccine.