The existing seasonal influenza vaccine does not provide broad long-term protection against seasonal influenza and must be remanufactured yearly due to frequens mutations and reassortment of theinfluenza genes. A universal influenza vaccine with the ability to raise long lasting immunity is the focus of several studies, including the Edufluvac project. Edufluvac is based on virus-likeparticles, a modern recombinant platform wellsuited for vaccinatin applications. Redbiotec's rePAX® technology allows the generation of multivalent recombinant baculovirus which generatesvirus-like particles presenting multiple proteins on the surface in insect cell culture. Any effects oninsect cell culture protein expression brought on by the regulatory elements controlling each gene in the baculovirus, or by the genome position of the baculovirus genes, could affect the composition of the virus-like  particles. The ai of this thesis was to elicit a better understanding of the protein expression by analysing multi-protein influenza virus-like particles and virus-like particles encoding a reporter gene regulated by different promoter and terminator combinations. Different bivalent and tetravalent influenza gene bacmids were cloned as well as seven bacmids encoding a YFP gene regulated by different promoter and terminator combinations. Spodopera frugiperda cells weretransfected with the bacmids and harvested recombinant baculovirus was used to perform testexpressions in High-Five™ cells. The resulting protein expression levels from the bivalent andtetravalent recombinant baculovirus were analyzed and compared by Western blots and ELISA assays. The expression of YFP in infected Spodoptera and High-Five™ cells was monitored byfluorescence microscopy and measured with FACS to quantify protein expression differencesbetween the seven promoter and terminator combinations. Analysis of the bivalent constructs indicated that the order of the genes in a recombinant baculovirus does not affect the protein expression in High-Five™ cells. The analysis of the tetravalent constructs revelaed positionalvariations in expressin of the H1 and M1 genes, but the number of test expressions and recombinant baculovirus construct clones included in the analysis were not hogh enough to allow a definitive conclusion. Of the different promoter and terminator constructs highest mean fluorescence intensity was reached with the reference combination. The early promoter yielded mean fluorescent intensitites that were close to the values of the negative control in both cell lines.

Vaccination is regarded by many as the most effective means of reducing influenza infection and disease; however, many people in the United States are hospitalized from flu-related illness each year. Adults 65 years and older account for more than half of these hospitalizations and almost all flu-related deaths. This project aimed to identify barriers to receiving the influenza vaccine among the adult population (> 65 years of age) in a community setting. The goal was to develop a teaching tool that would assist practitioners towards improving influenza vaccination rates among this population. The Health Belief Model was the theoretical framework utilized. The project was conducted at a primary care practice located in a community outside of New York City. Fifty participants (> 65 years) with no prior influenza vaccination were invited to take part in a short survey involving immunization status and reason for lack of influenza vaccination. Participants completed a researcher designed survey in a private location within the practice setting. Descriptive analysis was completed. Results revealed that 45 (32 females and 13 males) participants refused the influenza vaccine based on fear of becoming infected with the flu from the vaccine itself. The remaining 5 (males) participants based their refusal on never having the flu and therefore deemed the vaccine unnecessary. An educational handout was developed to aid in patient education related to influenza vaccination. Future implications involve the utilization of this tool by all healthcare worker and providers, as well as educating the target population in all community settings where influenza vaccines are administered, ultimately reducing the incidences of influenza and its associated complications by overcoming barriers to vaccination.

No description available.

According to existing literature, there is a suggested correlation between certain vaccinations and oral cavity symptoms. Studies have shown that the Diphtheria, Tetanus, Acellular Pertusis, as well as Polio Vaccinations have an association with presented symptoms of bleeding gums, sores, ulcers, white spots in the mouth or on lips, and unpleasant breath odor. Although these symptoms may not occur simultaneously or directly after administration of the immunization, there has been supported evidence of correlation. Given the relevance of an association between vaccinations and orally manifested side effects, an investigation on the presence of such association with the widely administered flu vaccine was conducted. Data for this work was collected from a population including undergraduate students studying at the University of Central Florida. A brief voluntary online survey requesting demographic information regarding administration of the vaccine as well as any experienced side effects was used. The study was cohort in nature as it tracked subjects with known exposure to the flu shot in the past six months to understand the outcome of interest. Results from the survey were used to determine that there is no correlation between orally manifested side effects and administration of the flu vaccine.

No description available.

We propose a novel analytic approach for the comparative statics analysis of operations management problems on the capacity investment decision and the influenza (flu) vaccine composition decision. Our approach involves exploiting the properties of the underlying mathematical models, and linking those properties to the concept of stochastic orders relationship. The use of stochastic orders allows us to establish our main results without restriction to a specific distribution. A major strength of our approach is that it is "scalable," i.e., it applies to capacity investment decision problem with any number of non-independent (i.e., demand or resource sharing) products and resources, and to the influenza vaccine composition problem with any number of candidate strains, without a corresponding increase in computational effort. This is unlike the current approaches commonly used in the operations management literature, which typically involve a parametric analysis followed by the use of the implicit function theorem. Providing a rigorous framework for comparative statics analysis, which can be applied to other problems that are not amenable to traditional parametric analysis, is our main contribution. We demonstrate this approach on two problems: (1) Capacity investment decision, and (2) influenza vaccine composition decision. A comparative statics analysis is integral to the study of these problems, as it allows answers to important questions such as, "does the firm acquire more or less of the different resources available as demand uncertainty increases? does the firm benefit from an increase in demand uncertainty? how does the vaccine composition change as the yield uncertainty increases?" Using our proposed approach, we establish comparative statics results on how the newsvendor's expected profit and optimal capacity decision change with demand risk and demand dependence in multi-product multi-resource newsvendor networks; and how the societal vaccination benefit, the manufacturer's profit, and the vaccine output change with the risk of random yield of strains. / Ph. D.

Seasonal influenza is associated with signiï¬?cant morbidity and mortality among older adults, aged 65 and older. Since vaccination is the single most effective preventive measure against seasonal influenza, clinicians and senior citizen center administrators need a better understanding of the perceptions of older adults concerning the reason for poor influenza vaccine uptake. The purpose of this study was to identify perceived factors that may be associated with poor influenza vaccination uptake among older adults. The health belief model (HBM) guided the study. The research questions examined perceptions predicting the odds of influenza vaccination uptake among older adults. This quantitative cross-sectional study consisted of administration of a newly developed 33-item questionnaire to a convenience sample of 147 older adult participants. A 2-week reliability test-retest on 50 participants indicated the instrument had moderate internal consistency (α -?¥ 0.7). Paired-sample t tests were not significant (p > .05), indicating that participants provided reliable responses across time. Ordinal regression analysis indicated that all HBM constructs were significantly associated (susceptibility, barriers, benefits, cues to action, and self-efficacy p = .000; severity p = .002) with frequency of influenza disease and recency of influenza vaccine uptake within 1 year. The social change implications from this study may help to improve vaccination uptake among older adults by providing senior public health decision makers and direct care clinicians with informed knowledge on perceptions and barriers that may play a role in influenza vaccination decision-making among older adults.

p. 1-112 / Submitted by Santiago Fabio (fabio.ssantiago@hotmail.com) on 2013-04-22T20:32:48Z No. of bitstreams: 1 888888.pdf: 674176 bytes, checksum: f92244bfa57e87ad156e565fa6dcfe86 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Creuza Silva(mariakreuza@yahoo.com.br) on 2013-05-04T17:20:26Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 888888.pdf: 674176 bytes, checksum: f92244bfa57e87ad156e565fa6dcfe86 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2013-05-04T17:20:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 888888.pdf: 674176 bytes, checksum: f92244bfa57e87ad156e565fa6dcfe86 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008 / Objetivos. Descrever a magnitude, a distribuição e a sazonalidade da morbidade hospitalar por causas relacionadas à influenza na população com 60 anos de idade e mais, segundo subgrupo etário, sexo e região de residência no Brasil, no período de 1992 a 2006. Métodos. Estudo observacional, ecológico, descritivo, misto, combinando a descrição das séries temporais de interesse, segundo múltiplos grupos, com uso de dados secundários, oriundos do Sistema de Informações Hospitalares do Sistema Único de Saúde do Brasil. Para a morbidade hospitalar por causas relacionadas à influenza, em população com 60 anos de idade e mais, foram consideradas as seguintes causas: influenza, pneumonia, bronquite crônica e não especificada e de obstrução crônica de vias respiratórias não classificadas em outra parte. Foram determinados os coeficientes de morbidade hospitalar por causas específicas, segundo três subgrupos etários: 60 a 69 anos, 70 a 79 anos e 80 anos e mais, sexo e região brasileira de residência no período de 1992 a 2006. Resultados. As causas de morbidade hospitalar relacionadas à influenza provocaram, no Brasil, 4.361.370 hospitalizações na população com 60 anos de idade e mais no período de 1992 a 2006, com um coeficiente anual médio de morbidade hospitalar de 22,0 por mil idosos. Os coeficientes foram semelhantes entre os sexos, mas crescentes com o aumento da faixa etária, sendo 4,2 vezes maior entre idosos mais velhos (80 anos e mais), quando comparado aos idosos mais jovens (60 a 69 anos). As regiões Sul, Centro-Oeste e Sudeste apresentaram coeficientes de morbidade hospitalar mais elevados, seguidas das regiões Norte e Nordeste. No Brasil, a maior magnitude identificada dos coeficientes de hospitalização foi observada nas quinzenas 9 a 19, representando os meses de maio a agosto de cada ano. Semelhante ao país, as 14 regiões Sul, Centro-Oeste e Sudeste também apresentaram maior concentração nessas quinzenas, com o pico máximo de coeficiente de hospitalização na quinzena 14, com 34,4, 23,3 e 14,8 hospitalizações para cada mil idosos, respectivamente. Já as regiões Norte e Nordeste têm maiores coeficientes de hospitalização em período anterior ao restante do país, concentrados nas quinzenas 5 a 15, com picos nas quinzenas 6 (12,4/1.000 idosos) na região Norte e 10 (12,7/1.000 idosos) na região Nordeste. Ao comparar o coeficiente médio de morbidade hospitalar por causas relacionadas à influenza dos períodos anterior (1992 a 1998) e posterior (1999 a 2006) ao início da campanha de vacinação contra influenza, percebeu-se uma redução importante do coeficiente no Brasil, nesse último período, sobretudo nas regiões Sul, Centro-Oeste e Sudeste. Conclusão. A configuração de perfis epidemiológicos diferenciados da doença, caracterizados pelos coeficientes de morbidade hospitalar, entre as regiões brasileiras, pode ter sido influenciada pela densidade demográfica, composição etária da população e pelas condições climáticas. A diminuição dos coeficientes após o ano 1999 no Brasil e em algumas regiões pode estar relacionada às campanhas de vacinação contra influenza. Estudos apropriados para estabelecer tendências da morbidade hospitalar e para determinar relações causais entre essas tendências e vacinação são necessários / Salvador

Since 2012-2013 influenza season, World Health Organization (who) recommends the formulation of tetravalent vaccines. Globally, many countries already use tetravalent vaccines in their national immunization programs, while in Latin America only a small number. Two Influenza b lineages co-circulate, their epidemiological behavior is unpredictable. On average they represent 22.6% of influenza cases and more than 50% in predominant seasons. The lack of concordance between recommended and circulating strains was 25 and 32% in the 2010-2017 and 2000-2013 seasons, respectively. There are no clinical differences between influenza A and B. It occurs more frequently from five to 19 years of age. Influenza b has a higher proportion of attributable deaths than influenza a (1.1 vs. 0.4%), or 2.65 (95% ci 1.18-5.94). A greater number of hospitalizations when the strains mismatch (46.3 vs. 28.5%; p <.0001). Different evaluations have demonstrated its cost effectiveness. The compilation of this information supports the use of quadrivalent vaccines in Latin American countries. / Revisión por pares

<p>Recent evidence suggests that vitamin D may be important for immune function. Canadian studies have reported varying prevalences of low levels of vitamin D. Whether these low vitamin D levels are associated with susceptibility to respiratory tract infections (RTIs) and infection severity remains unclear given the inconsistent association in recent studies. Influenza virus as a cause of RTI is of particular interest given its prevalence, morbidity and economic burden. Vaccination is a key strategy in prevention, but little is known about the effect of vitamin D on influenza vaccine response.</p> <p>A prospective cohort study of children 3 to 15 years old living in Hutterite communities in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba was conducted to assess the prevalence and predictors of low vitamin D levels and evaluate the association between vitamin D and the incidence and severity of laboratory proven respiratory tract infections. In those who received influenza vaccination, the relationship between vitamin D and influenza vaccine immunogenicity was examined.</p> <p>A total of 743 children were included in the study. The median serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D level (25[OH]D) was 62.0 nmol/L (interquartile range 51.0, 74.0). Levels lower than 50 nmol/L were present in 152 children (20.5%) and lower than 75 nmol/L in 565 children (76%). Lower serum 25(OH)D levels were associated with increased risk of RTI. No association was found between serum 25(OH)D level and disease severity. There was also no relationship found between serum 25(OH)D level and seroprotection or seroconversion from inactivated influenza vaccine.</p> <p>In conclusion, low serum 25(OH)D levels are a significant problem in Canadian Hutterite communities. Furthermore, low serum 25(OH)D levels were associated with increased risk of proven upper RTIs. Studies evaluating the role of vitamin D supplementation to reduce the burden of disease are warranted, and strategies to improve vitamin D status in rural communities in Canada are needed.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)