Update: Vaccines in Primary Immunodeficiency

Publication date: Available online 27 December 2017
Source:Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology
Author(s): Francisco A. Bonilla
Vaccines were originally developed in order to prevent or ameliorate infectious disease. As knowledge of immune function and the appreciation of immunodeficiency has developed, researchers have used vaccine responses as a tool to characterize the phenotypes of patients exhibiting various syndromes. Thus, it has become possible for a clinician to evaluate individual responses to vaccines in order to interrogate the immunocompetence of their patients. Although there have been many advances in these areas, we still have much to learn about the quantity and quality of humoral and cellular vaccine responses in normal and immunodeficient individuals and how that knowledge may then be extrapolated to diagnostic purposes. Adverse effects of vaccines have been recognized for many years, especially the occurrence of infections caused by viable vaccine organisms in immunodeficient hosts. Nevertheless, vaccines are essential for disease prevention in immunodeficient patients just as they are for healthy individuals. Clinicians must understand the appropriate and safe use of vaccines in patients with immunodeficiency. This review highlights some recent advances and ongoing challenges in application of vaccines for the diagnosis and treatment of immunodeficiencies.



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