Effects of immunization to hepatitis B vaccine in Iranian health staff: A systematic review and meta-analysis study

Introduction: Hepatitis B causes liver inflammation in human and is one of the major health problems worldwide. Currently, about 2 billion people are estimated to be infected with Hepatitis B worldwide. Various studies have reported different immune responses to hepatitis B vaccine (HBV) in Iranian health staff, while there is not any estimate of overall responses. Therefore, the present study was conducted to determine the immune response to HBV among health staff in Iran using meta-analysis method. Materials and Methods: This study was a systematic review of Iran databases related to the subject of immune response to HBV, including Magiran, Iran medex, Iran Doc, SID, Med lib and international databases including Scopus, Pub med, Science Direct, and also Google Scholar search engine. Only those articles that have had inclusion criteria were included. To combine the results of different random effects of studies, the meta-analysis was used. Results: There were 1084 subjects included in 9 studies. The immune response to HBV in health staff was 86.7% (CI: 95%, 80.9-92.6) after 1.21 years of last vaccination. This rate was estimated to be 93.5% for males (CI: 95%, 89.3-97.6) and 90.7% for females (CI: 95%, 84.9-96.5). The minimum and maximum vaccine responsewere reported from Tehran (70.6%) and Yazd (99.2%), respectively. Conclusion: The immunization to HBV in healthcare personnel was more than 80% after 1.21 years of last vaccination. Therefore, performing the complete course of hepatitis B vaccination for prevention of infection would be sufficient and booster dose would not be required