RSV Vaccine Effective Against Hospitalization in Older Adults: Daily Dose

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Patient Care brings primary care clinicians a lot of medical news every day—it’s easy to miss an important study. The Daily Dose provides a concise summary of one of the website's leading stories you may not have seen.

On September 10, 2024, we reported on a study published in JAMA that examined the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine effectiveness (VE) against RSV-associated hospitalization among adults aged 60 years and older.

The study

Investigators tapped electronic medical records for 2978 adults aged 60 years and older who were hospitalized with an acute respiratory illness at 1 of 24 sites in 19 states participating in a surveillance network between October 1, 2023, and March 31, 2024. All participants were tested for RSV, SARS-CoV-2, and influenza viruses. The final cohort of case participants tested positive for RSV alone; control participants tested negative for all 3 viruses of interest.

The findings

Of the original 2978-participant cohort, 367 (12.3%) were designated RSV cases and 2611 (87.7%) as controls, ie, did not have RSV, SARS-CoV-2, or influenza. Researchers reported VE against RSV-associated hospitalization of 75% (95% CI, 50%-87%), efficacy that did not change after estimation using inverse probability of vaccination weighting (79%; 95% CI, 56%-90%) or among adults aged 60 to 74 years (75%; 95% CI, 31%-91%) or 75 years and older (76%; 95% CI, 40%-91%).

Authors' comment

"This study provides initial data to inform ongoing risk-benefit analyses of RSV vaccines for older adults."

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