Evaluation of the prevalence and risk factors of varicella zoster infection in patients with hematologic malignancies

Varicella zoster virus (VZV) is a member of the Herpesvirideae family, which causes two different clinical pictures such as chicken pox and herpes zoster. Chicken pox often occurs as a primary infection in susceptible children after exposure to the viral agent. After the primary infection, VZV remains latent in dorsal root ganglia. Herpes zoster is a severely painful disease with vesicular rash localized along sensory nerves which usually occurs in elderly as the recurrence of the primary VZV infection. Both of these infections present moderately in those with intact immune system and in young people, but they cause severe clinical disease in immunedeficient patients. Due to the increase in immunosuppressive clinical applications such as organ transplantation and corticosteroid use, VZV infections became more important in clinical practice. This study was performed between July and December 2011 at Gaziantep University Şahinbey Research Hospital. Fifty-six adult patients who were hospitalized and receiving immunosuppressive therapy due to various hematologic malignancies at the Hematology clinic were investigated for VZV infection. Fifty-six volunteer donors admitted to the same hospital?s Blood Bank were selected as the control group. VZV IgG antibody was investigated by ELFA method. VZV IgG was detected in 92.9% (52/56) of patients with hematologic malignancies and in 71.4% (40/56) of individuals within the control group. When patient and control groups were compared, VZV IgG antibody was found statistically significantly higher in the patient group than the control group (p=0.003). According to these results, it is important that patients with hematologic malignancies should be investigated for VZV infection and in necessary conditions they should be given therapy for the prevention of possible complications.