First Appeared Thursday, 31 October '02

Healthy Men Sought for UCSF Vaccine Study

UCSF researchers at San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center (SFGHMC) are looking for healthy men between the ages of 18 and 45 to participate in a clinical trial to test a new vaccine strategy for preventing cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection.

CMV is a common viral infection — one of the human herpes viruses — with more than half of all adults infected. In general, CMV does not cause disease except in profoundly immuno-compromised patients such as transplant recipients or persons with advanced AIDS.

However, CMV infection, when acquired by women during pregnancy, can lead to serious neurological impairment to the child and is the most common infectious cause of neurological damage in newborns.

“Our strategy is to combine an anti-CMV vaccine that has been shown to reduce the severity of CMV disease in kidney transplant patients, but failed to protect against infection, with interleukin-12 (IL-12), an immune enhancing protein,” said Mark A. Jacobson, MD, professor of medicine in residence at UCSF’s Positive Health Program at SFGHMC.

“Both products have been tested separately and appear to be safe, so we do not anticipate serious toxicity issues, though this will be the first time they have been used together,” said Jacobson. Everyone in the study, which opens in November at the General Clinical Research Center at SFGHMC, will get vaccine but some participants will receive IL-12 and some a placebo.

Subjects will receive only one injection. An initial blood sample will be taken to screen for CMV and 11 additional blood samples will be drawn over a year.

Participants will receive $50 per study visit and an additional $200 for completing the study for a total of $750.

To participate, contact Doug Black, study coordinator, at 476-4082, ext. 136.

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Source: Jeff Sheehy