Aims: To evaluate antibody response to mRNA vaccine, identify subgroups with poor response and to determine long-term antibody durability in hematological patients.
Materials and methods: We have vaccinated 292 patients with all hematological malignancies with a third dose of mRNA COMIRNATY vaccine with a 12-month follow-up period in our center in Ostrava, Czech Republic.
Results: Antibody response for the whole cohort exceeded 74% through the whole 12-month follow-up. Lowest seroconversion was observed in CLL cohort (20/41, 48.8%), patients who received anti-CD20 therapy < 6 months before vaccination (8/30, 26.7%) and BTK inhibitors (3/6, 50.0%). On the contrary, patients with chronic myeloproliferative neoplasms and acute leukemia performed comparably with healthy population (33/33; 100% and 12/13; 92.3%, respectively). We have seen better results if the time interval between anti-CD20 therapy and additional vaccine dose was longer than 6 months (5/8 patients achieved seroconversion on 4th booster dose after previous failure). Also, 36 patients received a 4th dose of vaccine as a booster with measurable increase in protective antibodies in 50% (18/36).
Conclusions: Additional doses show promise for a well-timed revaccination even in poor responders. To our knowledge, no study comparable to our work in terms of follow-up length, vaccine consistency or variety of hematological malignancies and/or treatment has been reported yet. Our findings shed more light on long-term antibody response to mRNA vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 in patients with hematological cancer and bring important data for the evaluation of possible vaccine failure and scheduling of subsequent doses.
Keywords: COVID‐19; Cancer; Leukemia; Lymphoma; Myeloma; Vaccination.
© 2024 The Author(s). Cancer Medicine published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.