This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
LAIV reduced all-cause AOM
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
BOSTON — Live-attenuated influenza vaccine significantly reduced the incidence of all-cause acute otitis media among infants and young children, according to findings presented here during the 2012 Pediatric Academic Societies Annual Meeting.
Compared with placebo and trivalent influenza vaccine, children aged 6 to 71 months who received LAIV (FluMist, MedImmune) had fewer reported cases of AOM.
The findings showed that the pooled efficacy of LAIV in all children against all-cause AOM was 16.4% (P,.001) vs. placebo and 9.5% (P=.02) vs. TIV.
All-cause AOM was diagnosed in children in the placebo group who were aged younger than 2 years more frequently than in children aged at least 2 years (15.4% vs. 12.3%; P=.002). For children aged at least 2 years, efficacy with LAIV against all-cause AOM was 20.5% (P=.007) compared with placebo and 7.5% (P=.29) compared with TIV.
“If we look at the overall incidence of OM throughout the year and consider that the vaccine cannot be effective during summer months because influenza is not circulating, still the efficacy with reducing any OM is around 7% to 8% on an annual level,” study researcher Terho Heikkinen, MD, PhD, told Infectious Diseases in Children. “This is important for me as a pediatrician.”
Heikkinen and colleagues analyzed data regarding the incidence of AOM from five randomized, double blind, placebo-controlled trials in children aged 6 to 47 months (LAIV, n=6,587; placebo, n=4,905) and two randomized, double blind, controlled trials of TIV in children aged 6 to 71 months (LAIV, n=4,966; TIV, n=4,971). AOM was diagnosed clinically based on a visually abnormal tympanic, concomitantly with symptoms of an acute infection.
“We know that on an annual level, the decrease in overall incidence of OM by using pneumococcal vaccine (Prevnar 13, Pfizer) is around 6% to 7%, so these data indicate the efficacy of LAIV is as high in reducing the total incidence of OM as the full series of pneumococcal vaccine,” said Heikkinen, who is assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Turku in Finland. He also added that the pneumococcal and influenza vaccines are not mutually exclusive and children should be given both vaccines.
LAIV is approved for children aged 2 to 17 years and is not approved for use in children aged younger than 2 years.– by Cassandra A. Richards
For more information:
- Heikkinen T. #2915.213. Presented at: the 2012 PAS Annual Meeting; April 28-May 1, 2012; Boston.
Disclosure:This study was funded by MedImmune.