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August 27, 2014
High-Dose Flu Vaccine Offers 24% Greater Protection
for the Elderly Nashville—About a fourth of the influenza cases that occur despite vaccination in the elderly could be prevented if the higher dose formulation was used instead of the standard dose, according to a new study. That’s according to a study published recently in the New England Journal of Medicine. Vanderbilt University researchers report that high-dose influenza vaccine is 24% more effective than the regular vaccine in protecting those 65 and over against flu illness and complications. For the multicenter, industry-funded study, 31,989 participants from 126 research centers in the United States and Canada were enrolled during the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 influenza seasons to compare high-dose trivalent vaccine versus the standard-dose trivalent vaccine in older adults. “The study was done to see if using a high-dose vaccine protected older adults better than the usual vaccine. Until this trial came out we didn't know if it was going to be clinically better or not, and now we know it is better,” said lead author Keipp Talbot, MD. “Older adults are the most vulnerable to influenza; they become the sickest and have the most hospitalizations. This vaccine works better than the standard dose and hence I would tell my patients to get the high-dose vaccine every year,” Talbot noted. “In the meantime, we will continue to work to find newer and better vaccines for older adults.” In addition to determining overall effectiveness through inducing significantly higher antibody responses, study authors report that the high-dose vaccine is safe. Study data also indicates that the high-dose vaccine could help prevent hospitalizations, pneumonia, cardio-respiratory conditions, nonroutine medical visits, and medication use. “Prevention of influenza should lower hospitalizations, deaths, heart attacks, and pneumonia,” Talbot said. “This vaccine does have some more arm soreness than the usual vaccine because it is a higher dose. With this increased soreness comes greater protection.” The inactivated influenza vaccine tested, Sanofi Pasteur’s Fluzone High-Dose vaccine, contains four times the amount of antigen that is contained in the standard-dose Fluzone vaccine. “As compared with a standard-dose vaccine, a high-dose, trivalent, inactivated influenza vaccine (IIV3-HD) improves antibody responses to influenza among adults 65 years of age or older,” the authors note. “This study evaluated whether IIV3-HD also improves protection against laboratory-confirmed influenza illness.” |
U.S. Pharmacist Social Connect
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