SEROPREVALENCE OF MEASLES- AND MUMPS-SPECIFIC IgG AMONG JAPANESE HEALTHCARE STUDENTS INCREASED DURING 2007–2012

Monday, 25th of August 2014

[source]Japanese Journal of Infectious Diseases[|source]

To prevent hospital-acquired infections, physicians, healthcare workers, and healthcare students require immunity against vaccine-preventable diseases. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee of the US/CDC recommends immunization of healthcare personnel against Hepatitis B, Measles, Mumps, Rubella and Varicella. Notably, there were no such recommendations in Japan.

In this report, the authors introduced serological screening and vaccination for measles, rubella, mumps, varicella, and hepatitis B virus in 2007 for all medical, nursing and paramedical students on admission at Gunma University. The report documents that in the period 2007 – 2012, measles sero-prevalence increased from 52.7% in 2007 to 93.4% in 2009 and has been sustained above 90% since then. More details on findings and recommendations are accessible at: https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/yoken/66/5/66_411/_pdf

 

ABSTRACT

We evaluated the seroprevalence of vaccine-preventable infectious diseases among Japanese healthcare students to create immunization guidelines. Between 2007 and 2012, a total of 1746 Japanese medical, nursing, and paramedical students were serologically screened for measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, and hepatitis B virus (HBV) antibodies at the time of admission. In 2007, the seroprevalence of measles and mumps was 52.7% and 65.6%, respectively. The seroprevalence of measles dramatically increased to 96.6% in 2009 and was then sustained at >90%. The seroprevalence of mumps gradually increased to >80.0% between 2010 and 2012. The seroprevalence of rubella remained at >90% except in 2008 (85.6%), and the seroprevalence of varicella was sustained at >92% throughout 2007–2012. The seroprevalence of HBV antibody remained at <7% during 2007–2012. Although the seroprevalence of vaccine-preventable infectious diseases among Japanese healthcare students increased during the 2007–2012 study period, a substantial number of students were susceptible to vaccine-preventable infectious diseases. Therefore, we propose targeted immunization of Japanese healthcare students using serological screening prior to clinical training.