Adsorbed diphtheria-purified pertussis-tetanus combined vaccine(Osaka University)

We studied immunization for 128 handicapped patients, from 3 to 15 years of age, in a Seishi Gakuen Hospital, with 8 vaccines: diphtheria-purified acellular pertussis-tetanus combined (DPT), BCG, polio, measles, rubella, mumps, varicella, and Japanese B encephalitis. The rate of vaccination in these patients was lower than in healthy children at 3 years of age in Kanazawa City. There was no significant difference between patients with and without epilepsy. The rate was higher in the hospitalized patients than in the outpatients. More than 90% of the hospitalized patients was immunized against influenza under informed consent in 1997 and 1998. Despite pandemics of influenza in Kanazawa City, where the hospital was located, the period of fever by influenza was significantly shorter in our patients in both 1997 and 1998 than in 1996. Although a half of our patients had epilepsy, they were safely vaccinated with few side effects.

The gelatin-particle-agglutination (PA) test for titrating antibodies against diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus toxins was developed and used for assaying 65 sera from healthy children to assess the antitoxin acquisition in relation to the administration of adsorbed diphtheria-purified pertussis-tetanus (DPT) combined vaccine. The antitoxin titers obtained by the PA test and the conventional methods were correlated well; the correlation coefficient of the diphtheria antitoxin titers between the PA test and the cell culture method was 0.908, that of the tetanus antitoxin titers between the PA test and the passive hemagglutination test 0.968, and that of anti-pertussis toxin titers between the PA test and polystyrene-ball ELISA 0.885. The PA test was shown to be useful in both developed and developing countries, since it is simple to perform, sensitive and specific, and the three antitoxins can be titrated by the same procedure.