https://www.uphs.upenn.edu/bugdrug/antibiotic_manual/oipreventidsacdcstemcell2009.pdf

Guidelines for preventing infectious complications among hematopoietic cell transplantation recipients: a global perspective.

This paper attempts to summarize current knowledge about immune responses to vaccines that correlate with protection. Although the immune system is redundant, almost all current vaccines work through antibodies in serum or on mucosa that block infection or bacteremia/viremia and thus provide a correlate of protection. The functional characteristics of antibodies, as well as quantity, are important. Antibody may be highly correlated with protection or synergistic with other functions. Immune memory is a critical correlate: effector memory for short-incubation diseases and central memory for long-incubation diseases. Cellular immunity acts to kill or suppress intracellular pathogens and may also synergize with antibody. For some vaccines, we have no true correlates, but only useful surrogates, for an unknown protective response.

Correlates of Protection Induced by Vaccination

Summary Neuropathic pain develops as a result of lesions or disease affecting the somatosensory nervous system either in the periphery or centrally. Examples of neuropathic pain include painful polyneuropathy, postherpetic neuralgia, trigeminal neuralgia, and post-stroke pain. Clinically, neuropathic pain is characterised by spontaneous ongoing or shooting pain and evoked amplified pain responses after noxious or non-noxious stimuli. Methods such as questionnaires for screening and assessment focus on the presence and quality of neuropathic pain. Basic research is enabling the identification of different pathophysiological mechanisms, and clinical assessment of symptoms and signs can help to determine which mechanisms are involved in specific neuropathic pain disorders. Management of neuropathic pain requires an interdisciplinary approach, centred around pharmacological treatment. A better understanding of neuropathic pain and, in particular, of the translation of pathophysiological mechanisms into sensory signs will lead to a more effective and specific mechanism-based treatment approach.

/pdf/neuropathic-pain-diagnosis-pathophysiological-mechanisms-and-2fgs99rqus.pdf

Neuropathic pain: diagnosis, pathophysiological mechanisms, and treatment

/pdf/european-evidence-based-consensus-on-the-prevention-2i61racmdl.pdf

European evidence-based Consensus on the prevention, diagnosis and management of opportunistic infections in inflammatory bowel disease.

The Neuropathic Pain Special Interest Group of the International Association for the Study of Pain recently sponsored the development of evidence-based guidelines for the pharmacological treatment of neuropathic pain. Tricyclic antidepressants, dual reuptake inhibitors of serotonin and norepinephrine, calcium channel α2-δ ligands (ie, gabapentin and pregabalin), and topical lidocaine were recommended as first-line treatment options on the basis of the results of randomized clinical trials. Opioid analgesics and tramadol were recommended as second-line treatments that can be considered for first-line use in certain clinical circumstances. Results of several recent clinical trials have become available since the development of these guidelines. These studies have examined botulinum toxin, high-concentration capsaicin patch, lacosamide, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, and combination therapies in various neuropathic pain conditions. The increasing number of negative clinical trials of pharmacological treatments for neuropathic pain and ambiguities in the interpretation of these negative trials must also be considered in developing treatment guidelines. The objectives of the current article are to review the Neuropathic Pain Special Interest Group guidelines for the pharmacological management of neuropathic pain and to provide a brief overview of these recent studies.

/pdf/recommendations-for-the-pharmacological-management-of-onirid5i20.pdf

Recommendations for the Pharmacological Management of Neuropathic Pain: An Overview and Literature Update

background The incidence and severity of herpes zoster and postherpetic neuralgia increase with age in association with a progressive decline in cell-mediated immunity to varicella– zoster virus (VZV). We tested the hypothesis that vaccination against VZV would decrease the incidence, severity, or both of herpes zoster and postherpetic neuralgia among older adults. methods We enrolled 38,546 adults 60 years of age or older in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of an investigational live attenuated Oka/Merck VZV vaccine (“zoster vaccine”). Herpes zoster was diagnosed according to clinical and laboratory criteria. The pain and discomfort associated with herpes zoster were measured repeatedly for six months. The primary end point was the burden of illness due to herpes zoster, a measure affected by the incidence, severity, and duration of the associated pain and discomfort. The secondary end point was the incidence of postherpetic neuralgia. results More than 95 percent of the subjects continued in the study to its completion, with a median of 3.12 years of surveillance for herpes zoster. A total of 957 confirmed cases of herpes zoster (315 among vaccine recipients and 642 among placebo recipients) and 107 cases of postherpetic neuralgia (27 among vaccine recipients and 80 among placebo recipients) were included in the efficacy analysis. The use of the zoster vaccine reduced the burden of illness due to herpes zoster by 61.1 percent (P<0.001), reduced the incidence of postherpetic neuralgia by 66.5 percent (P<0.001), and reduced the incidence of herpes zoster by 51.3 percent (P<0.001). Reactions at the injection site were more frequent among vaccine recipients but were generally mild. conclusions The zoster vaccine markedly reduced morbidity from herpes zoster and postherpetic neuralgia among older adults.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMoa051016

C. E. Beisel

Papers

A vaccine to prevent herpes zoster and postherpetic neuralgia in older adults.

Letter to the Editor Immune Response to a Refrigerator-Stable Zoster Vaccine