Covid19
The Health Department is carrying out a clinical trial with a plasma infusion from patients who have overcome coronavirus
The La Fe Hospital in Valencia, the San Joan Hospital in Alicante and the Transfusion Centre in the Valencian Community have started a clinical trial to investigate whether the plasma from donors who have overcome the COVID-19 infection can help to improve the health of patients with an uncertain prognostic.
Four transfusions have been completed: two in the La Fe Hospital in Valencia, one in the San Joan Hospital in Alicante and one in the Clinical Hospital in Valencia.
The transfusion of hyperimmune plasma, which has been obtained from people who have overcome the infection and have neutralising antibodies for the virus, is a therapeutic tool which is being explored in cases in which the rest of the treatments, which mark the current protocols, have failed.
“It is a race between the virus, which wants to keep on continuing to replicate itself and damage organs, and the patient, who has to develop an effective immunity which might counteract it”, in the words of Miguel Salavert, head of the La Fe Hospital Department of Infectious Diseases.
“If the patient cannot win this race, we have to help him, and the way is to infuse him with plasma with many antibodies from hyperimmune donors” he indicated.
The first results are positive, as Gonzalo Salvador explained, the doctor attached to the La Fe Internal Medicine: “Our patient had already spent one month in hospital and, having tried other treatments, she continued to need immunosuppressing medication”.
“Therefore, we thought it best to support her with this therapeutic tool which we have, to help her finally eliminate the virus”, he advised. The woman, up to today, has already been able to walk without getting out of breath.
The second case treated in La Fe also resulted satisfactorily, and in the Clinic “it was an amazing recuperation, we are advised that he has already been able to return home”, Salavert commented.
The clinical investigation is open for the cooperation of all the Valencian centres: “it is an ambitious study. We would like to reach 200 patients (the donors will be necessary) and 200 controls, that is to say, 200 sick patients receiving the plasma (100 immunocompetent patients and 100 with low immunity) and a similar number in the control group”, said Marino Blanes, a doctor attached to the La Fe Hospital Infectious Diseases Unit.
“That is to say, people to whom this treatment will be offered, may reject it and they will be administered the other treatments as they are applying them to these patients and, in the absence of a confirmed effective therapy, this is an open way recommended by national and international bodies”, Marino Blanes details.
Also, Francisco Jover, head of the Infection Diseases Unit at the Alicante Sant Joan University Clinic said that “the two first patients were in the first phase of the pandemic and did not respond to the initial treatments. The profile of the other two patients corresponds to the objective of the study, to act in the earliest phases of the infection”.
He also said that “we have sent more than 30 donations from our hospital to the Transfusion Centre and the willingness of the donors is excellent”. Many of them were seriously ill and fortunately recovered and, besides, many are professional essential health workers”.
The donation procedure is safe
The donation of hyperimmune plasma is voluntary, similar to the current blood donation. The plasma is extracted and is processed in the Valencian Community Transfusion Centre, leaving the quantity of effective antibodies, and it is stored until the hospitals require it for a specific patient.
Anyone who has overcome the infection can donate and has developed antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus and who fulfils the criteria for convention blood donation. Health Professionals are already doing it.
The people who are candidates for receiving this antibody transfusion have, mainly, had autoimmune or oncohaematological diseases which cannot deal with the infection on their own.
With this clinical trial, for which the principal investigator is Marino Blanes, at the La Fe Hospital, the Valencian Community is joining a dozen centres which are developing in all the world clinical investigation in search for new treatments against the infection for COVID-19. The University Hospital Puerta de Hierro (Majadahonda), in Spain, and, internationally, centres in China, Colombia, Holland, France and the United States.
The La Fe Hospital in Valencia, the San Joan Hospital in Alicante and the Transfusion Centre in the Valencian Community have started a clinical trial to investigate whether the plasma from donors who have overcome the COVID-19 infection can help to improve the health of patients with an uncertain prognostic.
Four transfusions have been completed: two in the La Fe Hospital in Valencia, one in the San Joan Hospital in Alicante and one in the Clinical Hospital in Valencia.
The transfusion of hyperimmune plasma, which has been obtained from people who have overcome the infection and have neutralising antibodies for the virus, is a therapeutic tool which is being explored in cases in which the rest of the treatments, which mark the current protocols, have failed.
“It is a race between the virus, which wants to keep on continuing to replicate itself and damage organs, and the patient, who has to develop an effective immunity which might counteract it”, in the words of Miguel Salavert, head of the La Fe Hospital Department of Infectious Diseases.
“If the patient cannot win this race, we have to help him, and the way is to infuse him with plasma with many antibodies from hyperimmune donors” he indicated.
The first results are positive, as Gonzalo Salvador explained, the doctor attached to the La Fe Internal Medicine: “Our patient had already spent one month in hospital and, having tried other treatments, she continued to need immunosuppressing medication”.
“Therefore, we thought it best to support her with this therapeutic tool which we have, to help her finally eliminate the virus”, he advised. The woman, up to today, has already been able to walk without getting out of breath.
The second case treated in La Fe also resulted satisfactorily, and in the Clinic “it was an amazing recuperation, we are advised that he has already been able to return home”, Salavert commented.
The clinical investigation is open for the cooperation of all the Valencian centres: “it is an ambitious study. We would like to reach 200 patients (the donors will be necessary) and 200 controls, that is to say, 200 sick patients receiving the plasma (100 immunocompetent patients and 100 with low immunity) and a similar number in the control group”, said Marino Blanes, a doctor attached to the La Fe Hospital Infectious Diseases Unit.
“That is to say, people to whom this treatment will be offered, may reject it and they will be administered the other treatments as they are applying them to these patients and, in the absence of a confirmed effective therapy, this is an open way recommended by national and international bodies”, Marino Blanes details.
Also, Francisco Jover, head of the Infection Diseases Unit at the Alicante Sant Joan University Clinic said that “the two first patients were in the first phase of the pandemic and did not respond to the initial treatments. The profile of the other two patients corresponds to the objective of the study, to act in the earliest phases of the infection”.
He also said that “we have sent more than 30 donations from our hospital to the Transfusion Centre and the willingness of the donors is excellent”. Many of them were seriously ill and fortunately recovered and, besides, many are professional essential health workers”.
The donation procedure is safe
The donation of hyperimmune plasma is voluntary, similar to the current blood donation. The plasma is extracted and is processed in the Valencian Community Transfusion Centre, leaving the quantity of effective antibodies, and it is stored until the hospitals require it for a specific patient.
Anyone who has overcome the infection can donate and has developed antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus and who fulfils the criteria for convention blood donation. Health Professionals are already doing it.
The people who are candidates for receiving this antibody transfusion have, mainly, had autoimmune or oncohaematological diseases which cannot deal with the infection on their own.
With this clinical trial, for which the principal investigator is Marino Blanes, at the La Fe Hospital, the Valencian Community is joining a dozen centres which are developing in all the world clinical investigation in search for new treatments against the infection for COVID-19. The University Hospital Puerta de Hierro (Majadahonda), in Spain, and, internationally, centres in China, Colombia, Holland, France and the United States.
