The Importance of Pediatric H1N1 Vaccine Clinical Trial

Description: Dr. Mark Mulligan, MD, executive director of the Hope Clinic of the Emory Vaccine Center comments on the importance of the pediatric H1N1 vaccine clinical trials at Emory. Emory University and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta have begun vaccinating children in a clinical trial testing an investigational H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine along with the seasonal flu vaccine. Background Physician/researchers at Emory University and Children's Healthcare of Atlanta have begun vaccinating children in a clinical trial testing an investigational H1N1 (swine flu) vaccine along with the seasonal flu vaccine. Up to 650 children nationally will participate in the study, and Emory will enroll approximately 100 children, ages six months to 18 years. The clinical trial is being conducted within the Vaccine and Treatment Evaluation Units (VTEUs), supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). At Emory, the VTEU is led by Mark Mulligan, MD, executive director of the Hope Clinic of the Emory Vaccine Center. The study will examine the safety of and measure the body's immune response to the H1N1 flu vaccine. In addition, it will help determine how and when the vaccine should be given with the seasonal flu vaccine to make it most effective. It also will analyze potential problems of giving the vaccines together, such as whether one vaccine will undermine the protective power of the other. The answer is important because