COVID-19 vaccine study focuses on teenagers with a weakened immune system
Vulnerable young patients in Southampton and London are being invited to take part in new research studying how they respond to COVID-19 vaccination.
Recent findings from the national OCTAVE study suggest that some immunocompromised adults have less protection through vaccination than healthy adults.
This research has now been extended to include children aged between 12 and 17 years old.
Young immunocompromised patients are being invited to take part at Southampton Children’s Hospital and Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH).
Weakened immune system
Immunocompromised children have a weakened immune system. This can be either due to illness, or treatments such as organ transplants or chemotherapy.
COVID-19 vaccination is recommended in the UK for immunocompromised children aged 12 and over, but it’s currently unclear how much protection they get from it.
The body relies on a well-functioning immune system for a good response to vaccination. Immunocompromised people tend to be the least likely to develop an antibody response afterwards. This means they might not get the same protection as others from the same number of doses.
Evidence has shown this group is more likely to have severe infection. Yet there are huge variations between individuals and different immune conditions.
Testing vaccine responses
The OCTAVE study looked at the response to COVID-19 vaccines in immunocompromised adults across 10 UK sites from May 2021. It is funded as part of the COVID-19 Immunity National Core Study by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). The research is administered by the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the National Institute for Health and Research (NIHR).
Now, with funding from the Vaccine Task Force, doctors and research teams from across the UK have come together to answer key questions for their teenage, immunosuppressed patients, as well as adults.
The study will recruit up to 160 immunocompromised children aged between 12 and 17 years. They will have already received the recommended COVID-19 vaccine doses.
It will investigate questions such as whether these children need extra doses of COVID-19 vaccine, or ‘boosters’, to be protected. The researchers expect to have their first set of results by Autumn 2022.
Dr Jessica Bate, consultant paediatric oncologist at Southampton Children’s Hospital, is OCTAVE’s lead consultant for children with cancer.
Dr Bate says: “The OCTAVE study is an example of collaboration across adult and paediatric centres, NHS hospitals and academic institutions. It will help us answer the important questions about how well the COVID-19 vaccine works in children with a suppressed immune system.”
The study is led from the Universities of Glasgow and Birmingham and run by Birmingham’s Cancer Research UK Clinical Trials Unit (CRCTU).
Professor Pam Kearns, Director of Birmingham CRCTU, said: “This extension study is a great step forward for the over 12s but we are hoping to also amend the study to also include five-12 year olds to capture the full age range of immunocompromised patients receiving the COVID vaccines.
“As soon as we are offering this vaccine at any age, we want to be robustly and accurately recording the data through a research programme, just as we have for adults.”