Systematic Review of the Cost Effectiveness of Herpes Zoster Vaccination

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) develops evidence-based recommendations about preventive care based on comprehensive systematic reviews of the best available evidence. Decision models provide a complementary, quantitative approach to support the USPSTF as it deliberates about the evidence and develops recommendations for clinical and policy use. This article describes the rationale for using modeling, an approach to selecting topics for modeling, and how modeling may inform recommendations about clinical preventive services.  

In a New York Times report, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended the use of a new vaccine to prevent herpes zoster (“shingles”) among adults in the US. “In an unusually close vote, an advisory panel to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday recommended the use of a new vaccine to prevent shingles over an older one that was considered less effective. "The decision was made just days after the…

This article reports on a clinical trial (NCT01954251) of herpes zoster subunit vaccine (HZ/su) co-administered with a quadrivalent seasonal inactivated influenza vaccine (IIV4) in adults age 50 years and older. Outcome measures were vaccine response rate and antibody response in the intervention compared to control groups.  There were 413 subjects in the intervention group and 415 in the control. Antibody response was within statistical limits for similarity between the two groups; no safety concerns were…