Fiona Strouts, MSc, PhD

Early season influenza vaccination of patients with HIV may influence the risk of infection later in the season.

Self-reported marijuana use among HIV-infected patients was not associated with changes in body mass index (BMI), CD4 T-cell counts, or detectable HIV RNA.

Outpatient treatment with parenteral antimicrobial therapy with beta-lactam antibiotics is effective; however, antibiotic switches for adverse events (AEs) occurred more frequently with oxacillin use.

Insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) and sex steroid hormones were not associated with changes in bone mineral density (BMD) in HIV- and HCV-infected patients, but IGF-1 levels were significantly decreased in HCV and negatively correlated with liver disease severity.

Use of prescription erectile dysfunction (ED) medication was significantly associated with sexual risk behavior in HIV-positive men.

Dually treated HIV/HBV co-infected patients had a higher risk of hip fracture than HBV mono-infected, antiretroviral therapy (ART)-treated HIV-mono-infected, and HIV/HBV uninfected patients.

Women who are HIV positive and pregnant have high rates of preterm delivery (PTD) and deliver children who are small for gestational age (SGA) in Canada.

The safety and immunogenicity of the investigational combination vaccine, DTaP5-IPV-Hib-HepB, when given as a 3-dose infant series, were comparable to equivalent licensed component vaccines.

Efficacy of 13-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV13) in the prevention of vaccine-type community-acquired pneumonia (VT-CAP) or invasive pneumococcal disease (VT-IPD) declined with age.

Two investigational formulations of meningococcal MenABCWY vaccines have shown comparable immunogenicity to the licensed vaccines (MenACWY-CRM) and serogroup B (4CMenB), and the full outer membrane vesicle formulation gave higher GMT responses against B test strains.