Not Immune, had Hepatitis Vaccine and Booster!!

[NurseLizard]

I have had the Hepatitis Vaccine series and a Booster. My titer still says that I have no immunity to the disease? Why~~!!!?! The lady at our lab says that some people never aquire immunity. My supervisor recomends getting another booster, cant say that I am thrilled with injecting all this crap into my body if it isn't doing any good anyway. Comments, questions or advice?????? Thanks! :confused:

[lucianne]

I had the series twice and still didn't seroconvert. I recently had one last booster (trying to get into clinicals). The MD said to come back in exactly one month for the titer and if I haven't converted then, I'm not going to. (I'm over 40, too). Fortunately, my chance of exposure to Hep B should be pretty low.

luci

[MOOSEMAN]

Thought I was the only one that had problems. Initial series was back in 94, Questionable needle stick in 97 found out not converted. Got boosted and retested still no conversion. Had the series again in 2002 and guess what, still no conversion. Makes it scary to work with all the questionable pt that I see in the ED. Didn't know that age may be a factor. I'm 46. :)

[featherzRN, MSN]

I got my vaccine in 88 (age 21) and my titers are still going strong 15 years later. Yowsa!

H.

[NurseLizard]

Thank You for all the wonderful advice and it really helps to know that I am not alone. And, if you are hepatits positive your titers will also be high. They need to be above 10 to be immune and mine are only 2. It is scary to be suseptilble to this in our profession.

[RNPD]

originally posted by KiddoRN

My doc said a high IgM hep titer would mean I have the virus and a high IgG titer would mean that I responded to the vaccinations and developed antibodies.

Thanks I didn't know that. I was only given the info that my titer was 1.9. It didn't specify which but obviously it must have been IgG.

[kids]

Originally posted by kiddoRN

My doc said a high IgM hep titer would mean I have the virus and a high IgG titer would mean that I responded to the vaccinations and developed antibodies. I had neither. So I not only do not have Hep B but I don't have antibodies to fight it if I was exposed in the future.

Ditto here...except the ID Doc said that I may be silently immune ('95) but that there are (were?) no good stats of people infected after receiving the series. I was told that my 2 children with my same blood type (O+ as opposed to Dads A+) would likely not convert either but have never found any documentation on it.

I've had the series twice. My current employer goes for the more conservitive recommendation of a booster Q 9 years so I am due for one of those.