A press release from MultiCare.
TACOMA, Wash. — MultiCare Health System is looking for volunteers for a clinical trial designed to evaluate the immune responses of COVID-19 vaccine booster shots with other vaccinations. The GSK clinical trial, led by the MultiCare Institute for Research and Innovation, will pair one dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine with either a shingles or an influenza booster vaccine. The trial is set to begin October 7, 2021.
The Research Institute is looking to enroll 200 adults in the Puget Sound region, all of whom must meet the following requirements:
- Are 18 years and older
- Have received both doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at least six months prior
- Have not received any previous vaccination for influenza in the previous six months, or any previous shingles vaccination other than the live, attenuated vaccine
- Are not pregnant or planning to become pregnant within the next two months.
Participants who are under 50 years of age will only be eligible for the influenza vaccine, while participants over 50 can receive either the influenza or shingles vaccine.
“As we move to a future where booster shots for our current COVID-19 vaccines are commonplace, it is likely that they will be given alongside other vaccines such as flu shots and the shingles vaccine at the same time,” explains Dr. Jonathan Staben, the trial’s principal investigator in the Inland Northwest region, and a primary care physician at MultiCare Rockwood Clinic in Spokane. “We need to continue to do research and study whether giving certain vaccines at the same time affects their performance.
“If someone is planning on getting a booster, because of health conditions or a high-risk profession, this is a great study to be involved in,” Dr. Staben adds.
Volunteers who participate in the GSK trial will be asked to make six or more in-person clinic visits and two telephone check-in visits over a 24-week period. Participants will have blood drawn several times to monitor results and will be asked to maintain diaries tracking how they feel. Volunteers may be reimbursed for expenses incurred while participating in the trial.
“While billions of doses of different COVID-19 vaccines have been administered around the world, we are still working to understand the nuances of how long their protection lasts and how it differs from person to person,” says Dr. Vinay Malhotra, the trial’s principal investigator for the Puget Sound region and a cardiologist from MultiCare’s Pulse Heart Institute. “We also are studying what may be additional advantages of combining the COVID-19 vaccines with other vaccines, such as shingles and annual flu vaccines.”
The MultiCare Institute for Research & Innovation is a leading medical research institute in the Pacific Northwest, and its groundbreaking research has included 27 previous COVID-19 clinical trials, including a large COVID-19 vaccine trial in January 2021.
Interested in participating in the study? Please email research@multicare.org or call 253-403-7249.
