| News From Transplant Week of February 3, 2002 / Vol. 3 No. 5 |
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Study: Vaccination for Hepatitis B After Liver Transplant Not a Success |
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Italian researchers report that an effort to use a reinforced hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccine schedule to prevent viral recurrence in liver transplant recipients was largely ineffective. The vaccine regimen was tested in 17 patients, who had liver transplants because of hepatitis B-related liver cirrhosis, as an alternative to taking anti-hepatitis B immunoglobulin along with their immunosuppressive medications. Mario Angelico of the Department of Public Health in Rome reported in the journal Hepatology that the vaccine regimen, consisting of 9 doses or more of recombinant HBV vaccine given at designated intervals, failed to produce any significant results in 15 of the 17 transplant recipients. "A highly reinforced HBV vaccination program is effective only in a few patients who had liver transplants for HBV-related cirrhosis," the researchers concluded. The results of the Italian study were particularly disappointing in light of a recent report by researchers in Barcelona of more success in using a vaccine regimen with a lower-risk group of liver transplant patients. The editors of Hepatology, in an editorial commenting on the "disparate" experiences from Italy and Spain, said the search for an "optimal vaccine to induce protective active immunity in patients transplanted for hepatitis B has not been established." "In the
meantime, anti-hepatitis B immunoglubulin and antiviral therapy
will remain the cornerstone in the prevention of recurrent hepatitis
B after liver transplantation," the editors concluded. Other sources: Hepatology |
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