Patients with secondary immunodeficiencies are at a high risk of infection. Currently some of these infections are preventable through specific immunization. Prevention of these diseases can diminish morbidity and mortality amongst these patients. In this review we describe the use of vaccines in persons with secondary immunodeficiencies.

According to the joint United Nations Programme on HIV and/or AIDS (UNAIDS) report (2010) on the global acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) epidemic, 33.3 million people were living with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and AIDS by the end of 2009 worldwide (UNAIDS 2010:23). Unfortunately sub-Saharan Africa still seems to bear an ‘... inordinate share of the global HIV burden’ (UNA...

A case of superficial skin lesions due to T. asahii is reported, concerning an immune-deficient patient while receiving micafungin. Yet, T. asahii is assumed as intrinsically resistant to echinocandines. Thus, compared to echinocandines, azoles should be preferred in antifungal prophylaxis of immunosuppressed patients because they treat a wider variety of opportunistic fungi, including T. asahi...

Skin color is one of the most distinct features in the human race. To assess the mechanisms of skin color variation, human skin substitutes (HSS) were constructed by grafting mixtures of cultured keratinocytes and melanocytes from a combination of donor skin types, together with light skin derived fibroblasts, into chambers inserted onto the back skin of severe combined immunodeficient (SCID) m...

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a demyelinating disease of the central nervous system (CNS). Although the causes are not known, the pathogenesis likely involves complex relationships between autoimmunity, immunogenetics, immunologic deficiency and viral infection. The evidence for such interrelationships is discussed.

An inherited deficiency of adenosine deaminase (adenosine aminohydrolase, EC 3.5.4.4) is associated with an autosomal recessive form of severe combined immunodeficiency disease. Affected patients exhibit markedly reduced or absent adenosine deaminating activity in various tissues. In this study we have demonstrated the presence of a low level aminohydrolase activity in 11 different normal and a...

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), first appeared in NSW in the early 1980s. Since then, HIV has had a significant affect on public health, causing over 3,400 deaths from AIDS and 12,500 infections. Within Australia, most cases of HIV infection have been reported in NSW. This article describes the effect that the HIV epidemic has...

Physicians have recognized for more than a century that alcohol use is associated with infections and that alcoholics are especially at risk for pneumonia. Clear evidence now indicates that alcohol has a systemic effect on every organ. This review first presents a clinical case to describe a patient with immunity issues complicated by alcohol use-a setting familiar to many clinicians. This is f...

Some of the many ways in which mathematical biology and statistics have been used in investigating the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) epidemic are reviewed. Aspects of the spread of the disease via social and sexual networks are discussed. The different kinds of data involved are critically compared. Some studies of the incubation period are briefly reviewed and some comments made on...

A 38-year-old black man died from acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) after a 15-month course. The autopsy revealed a pancolitis and a pneumonia caused by cytomegalovirus (CMV). Exceptionally, there also was a periventricular encephalitis caused by the same organism. Identification of the virus was aided by immunoperoxidase methods.