Author Description

This dissertation, "The Determinants of Influenza Vaccination Effectiveness in People Aged 65 Years and Older: a Systematic Review" by Wey Wen, Lim,, was obtained from The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) and is being sold pursuant to Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License. The content of this dissertation has not been altered in any way. We have altered the formatting in order to facilitate the ease of printing and reading of the dissertation. All rights not granted by the above license are retained by the author. Abstract: Background Influenza vaccination effectiveness is generally lower in people aged 65 years and above compared with healthy adults below the age of 65. While this is generally attributed to weaker immune response in the elder population as a result of immunosenescence, the reasons for this phenomenon are not well characterised. The aim of this systematic review is to identify, investigate and summarise documented determinants of seasonal vaccine effectiveness in the elderly population. Methods A literature search was conducted on bibliographic databases PubMed and EMBASE to identify relevant articles that investigate the determinants of influenza vaccine effectiveness in the elder population up to July 4, 2015. Findings Out of 37 relevant studies that were identified through the search process, eight studies that assess potential determinants of influenza vaccine effectiveness in the elder population were identified. The determinants that were described include vaccine type and route of administration, time elapsed after vaccination, frailty, and pneumococcal vaccination. While this list of determinants is not exhaustive, they were determinants that were assessed using endpoints that are linked to confirmed diagnosis of influenza among studies identified in this review. Conclusions Besides antigenic match, documented determinants of influenza vaccine effectiveness in the elder populati