Meningococcal Vaccination

[bigmighty]

DS 14 has been in PANDAS symptom remission for 100 days (yay!). Pediatrician wants to know when he will get meningitis vaccine. I know some kids get recurrence of PANDAS symptoms from vaccines. I also know that a lot of teens get meningitis and it can be very serious. If you were us, would you go ahead with it, or wait until your child had been symptom-free for longer? Thanks.

[colleendonny]

Personally I wouldn't do it. Period. I would be too concerned of it being a trigger. Is this one of the vaccines where his titers could be checked beforehand?

[Kiera]

Dr K says no coccal vaccines. Dr B says no vaccines. I would not vaccinate! Not worth the risk. I survived without the meningitis vaccine! If you know your child has an immune system issue, do not vaccinate IMHO.

[nicklemama]

Personally, I would not get the vaccine. A flu mist vaccine is what triggered my DS's major PANDAS episode. Dr K and Dr T told me "no more vaccines".

[Mayzoo]

Have you checked his titers yet? He may not even "need" to be vaccinated as his titers may be high enough. My rubella titers were through the roof during my pregnancy and I had not been vaccinated in over 20 years.

 

Because we home school and kiddos medical issues, we have been very selective on vaccines.

Edited July 29, 2012 by Mayzoo

[Kiera]

Have you checked his titers yet? He may not even "need" to be vaccinated as his titers may be high enough. My rubella titers were through the roof during my pregnancy and I had not been vaccinated in over 20 years

Regarding the menengicoccal vaccine, the 1st one is given at age 11yrs I believe, therefore there will not be any antibodies to it in the blood unless your child has been exposed to the actual disease through someone (but you'd probably know about that)

[oivay]

Let me just share my menigitis vaccine story with you.

 

My daugther had to get it before entering 6th grade. I was ok with it as I felt the need to "protect her brain" after she'd had a severe pandas/chorea episode and had been symptom free for about 3 months. She got the vaccine, and in less than a week began showing symptoms of another pandas/chorea episode, which got rapidly worse within a week. To be fair, at this point, within a week of her getting the vaccine, both of my kids tested positive for strep, which was quite obvious at that point, even before they rapid tested them, which were both immediately highly positive. Ped immediately put them both on suprax, which cured little one, but older pandas kid declined rapidly to the point where she was immobile with severe almost total body chorea. Neuro immediately put her on clindamycin and prednisone, and ped threw in some valium. She was back to normal within a week.

 

I'll never know if it was the strep that touched off that episode, but the timing was so coincidental I still wonder about it. Dr. T said absolutely no more vaccines, which is a moot point now as she's had them all, but I'd never get her another vaccine.

[mdmom]

Just talked to Dr. T about vaccines, and he said no more - too risky for PANS/PANDAS kids. He has patients that have had exacerbations from vaccines.

[bigmighty]

Thank you all so much for the stories, insights, and doc recommendations. Our ped will do as we request, so we'll just skip the shot. Again, I cannot tell you how much I appreciate knowing this information. Thank you! - Suzanne