Cases were rare. Most gave the impression within seven days of vaccination and patients recovered, found the study, which was presented Saturday at American Heart Association clinical sessions. The papers are initial until the full effects are published in a peer-reviewed journal.
Researchers tested the fitness records of millions of Southern Californians to see if third doses of vaccines, which use mRNA generation to activate the body’s defenses against the coronavirus, were linked to myocarditis, an inflammation of the core muscle.
“This is a question because with additional doses of COVID-19 mRNA vaccines recommended, it is critical to monitor their safety,” said Dr. Mingsum Lee, the study’s principal investigator and a cardiologist at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Los Angeles.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, myocarditis has been considered a rare but serious prospective side effect of COVID-19 vaccination, more after a momentary dose than after the first.
Lee and his colleagues reviewed records of adults who were part of Kaiser Permanente’s fitness plan in Southern California and gained at least one dose of the vaccine between Dec. 14, 2020, and Feb. 18, 2022, before the updated “bivalent” booster formulations were released. Available. The median age of those studied was 47 years. About 54% of those studied were women; 39% were Hispanic; 30% were white; 13 per cent were Asian; and 7% were black.
The researchers searched the medical records of other people hospitalized with myocarditis within 21 days of receiving the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.
Of the more than 3 million members who won the first dose, six other people were hospitalized with myocarditis. Of the 2. 9 million who gained a momentary dose, 26 developed myocarditis requiring hospitalization, of which 21 cases occurred within seven days. Of the 1. 4 million who gained a 3rd dose, nine were hospitalized with myocarditis, adding up to seven instances occurring in one week.
Compared to what would have been expected in the same population a year before the pandemic, the occurrence of myocarditis was 4 times higher after the current dose and 2. 6 times higher after the third dose.
But overall, rare myocarditis, most cases were mild and symptoms resolved without extensive intervention, said Lee, who is also a clinical scientist in the studies and evaluation arm of Kaiser Permanente Southern California.
Eight of the nine cases of myocarditis after the third dose were in men and five in other people aged 18 to 40. Previous studies have shown an increased risk of post-vaccine myocarditis in adolescents and young men.
Lee said those threats need to be put into context, given that other studies have shown that the threat of myocarditis is much higher after COVID-19 infection than after vaccination.
Epidemiologist Howard Sesso, an associate professor of medicine in the department of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, agrees. “This does not replace the resolution of getting vaccinated or not. The benefits still far outweigh the small potential dangers like this,” he said. .
In addition to myocarditis, COVID-19 increases the risk of other headaches and has killed more than a million people in the United States.
The CDC recommends that others age five and older get a bivalent booster if it has been at least two months since their last dose of COVID-19 vaccine.
Sesso, who was not involved in the new study, said its giant length by leveraging electronic fitness records is impressive. While the effects are not surprising, he said, “these are vital, suggestive findings that need to be replicated” and tracked.
Even a giant study faces demanding situations to unravel data as sophisticated as a possible link to myocarditis, he said, and such studies can only show a correlation, not cause and effect.
More studies are needed on the imaginable biological explanations behind any connection, he said. And to that end, it would be attractive to see more information and studies comparing other people in this study who developed myocarditis with those who didn’t.
The researchers pointed out some of the limitations of their work and added the option that some cases of myocarditis might have been missed if other people did not seek treatment in the hospital.
More studies will be needed as coronavirus and vaccine recommendations continue to evolve, Lee said. Some other people are already on their fifth dose.
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