New data on chronic hemodialysis patients show improved response to BNT162b2 anti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccine when treated with polymethylmethacrylate dialysis membrane compared to polysulfone.
At the recent 62nd annual meeting of the Italian Society of Nephrology (SIN), Prof. Castellano presented groundbreaking results on how chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients undergoing hemodialysis (HD) treatment with polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) membrane show improved response to BNT162b2 anti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccine compared to patients hemodialyzed with a polysulfone (PS) membrane.
There is a strong rationale for ensuring an optimal immune-protective vaccine coverage in CKD patients. CKD patients are immuno-compromised due to their pathology and this is worsening with hemodialysis treatment. Patients undergoing hemodialysis are fragile patients with an increased risk of acquiring infections and developing severe COVID-19 with a fatal outcome. Previous studies have shown that HD patients due to their altered immune profile tend to have a reduced response to vaccinations, and this has also been demonstrated for the anti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccine.
In the following we introduce the immunological aspects of humoral and cell-mediated vaccine response before summarizing the data presented by Prof. Castellano. Finally, we elaborate on the characteristics of the PMMA dialysis membrane that may contribute to an improved response to anti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccination.
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