Health officials say side effects to COVID-19 vaccine mean it’s working

As more people get the COVID-19 vaccine, we’re working to find out why some people have no reaction to the shot, while others experience some side effects.

Vaccines continue to roll out across the country and our region, and people are seeing varying side effects to their shots.

Steve Cadora of Roanoke said it was smooth sailing.

“I had a little bit of fatigue, but I think that’s because I was so excited I got four and a half hours sleep the night before. Other than a little bit of drowsiness, zero symptoms,” Cadora said.

But not everyone has been as lucky, with some others reporting mild to severe reactions in the hours that follow getting stuck.

Joshua Garbrielson of Roanoke said he was surprised by his reaction, but it was nothing he couldn’t handle.

“I had a little bit of a temperature the next day, and I kind of felt a little groggy almost like I had the flu, I was tired, I took an hour-long nap,” Gabrielson said.

Both received the Johnson and Johnson vaccine at different points over the last month and a half.

Dr. Noelle Bissell of the New River Valley Health District said reports of major side effects in our area are rare, and symptoms mean it’s working.

“Those are all expected, normal side effects. They do not mean that, I mean the vaccine can not give you COVID, this is the vaccine revving up your immune system to fight COVID,” Dr. Bissell said.

Both men are back to full health and feel thankful they’ve been vaccinated. They said being protected against COVID-19 far outweighs any negative, short-term side effects.

“To me, it was like a minor speedbump in the road, honestly with the symptoms that I had,” Gabrielson said.

“The people that you trust for your medical care are going to recommend that you get it and there’s really no reason not to listen to them,” Cadora said.

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Artificial Intelligence to determine whether immunotherapy is working or not

Researchers working on Artificial Intelligence has hit another milestone as they have found a way to predict if a lung cancer patients can be benefited from expensive immunotherapy.

And, once again, they’re doing it by teaching a computer to find previously unseen changes in patterns in CT scans taken when the lung cancer is 1st diagnosed compared to scans taken after the first 2-3 cycles of immunotherapy treatment.

“This is no flash in the pan — this research really seems to be reflecting something about the very biology of the disease, about which is the more aggressive phenotype, and that’s information oncologists do not currently have,” said a scientist, who works at Centre for Computational Imaging and Personalised Diagnostics (CCIPD).

 

Madabhushi said the recent work by his lab would help oncologists know which patients would actually benefit from the therapy, and who would not.

“Even though immunotherapy has changed the entire ecosystem of cancer, it also remains extremely expensive — about $200,000 per patient, per year,” Madabhushi said.

“That’s part of the financial toxicity that comes along with cancer and results in about 42% of all newly diagnosed cancer patients losing their life savings within a year of diagnosis,” added Madabhushi.

Having a tool based on the research being done now by his lab would go a long way toward “doing a better job of matching up which patients will respond to immunotherapy instead of throwing $800,000 down the drain,” he added, referencing the four patients out of five who will not benefit, multiplied by annual estimated cost.
 Khorrami, a graduate student working at the CCIPD, said one of the more significant advances in the research was the ability of the computer program to note the changes in texture, volume and shape of a given lesion, not just its size.

“This is important because when a doctor decides based on CT images alone whether a patient has responded to therapy, it is often based on the size of the lesion,” Khorrami said. “We have found that textural change is a better predictor of whether the therapy is working.

“Sometimes, for example, the nodule may appear larger after therapy because of another reason, say a broken vessel inside the tumour — but the therapy is actually working. Now, we have a way of knowing that,” added Khorrami.

Prasanna, a postdoctoral research associate in Madabhushi’s lab, said the study also showed that the results were consistent across scans of patients treated at two different sites and with three different types of immunotherapy agents.

Prasanna added the initial study used CT scans from 50 patients to train the computer and create a mathematical algorithm to identify the changes in the lesion.

Additionally, Madabhushi said, researchers were able to show that the patterns on the CT scans which were most associated with a positive response to treatment and with overall patient survival were also later found to be closely associated with the arrangement of immune cells on the original diagnostic biopsies of those patients.

This suggests that those CT scans actually appear to capture the immune response elicited by the tumours against the invasion of cancer — and that the ones with the strongest immune response were showing the most significant textural change and most importantly, would best respond to the immunotherapy, he said.

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What To Do About Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

If you ever experienced numbness in your hands and fingers as you fell asleep it might be an early sign of carpal tunnel syndrome, which affects an estimated 4-10 million Americans. If ignored it can cause long-term damage, so it's really important to take preventive measures against it. Here are six effective ways to treat numbness in hands, which we recommend you give a try as soon as you experience the early signs of carpal tunnel syndrome. But first, let's take a look at what carpal tunnel syndrome is.
Carpal tunnel syndrome is also known as a median nerve compression. The first symptoms that occur are numbness and tingling in the hands and wrists at night. As the condition progresses, the symptoms may worsen during the day. Furthermore, carpal tunnel syndrome is more common among women than men and is more likely to affect middle-aged people. Here's what you can do about it:

 

 

1. Take frequent breaks
Carpal tunnel symptoms are especially evident among people whose jobs require a lot of repetitive motion in their hands and wrists. Your hands need regular breaks between working sessions, so be sure to set a reminder every two to three hours and do a little exercise. 

2. Keep wrists straight while working

There is a positive association between wrist posture and carpal tunnel syndrome, studies show. Adjust your chair so that your forearms are level with your keyboard and try to keep your wrists in a neutral position without bending them.  

3. Consider wearing a wrist splint
Wearing a splint will hold your wrist in a neutral position. It is especially important to wear one if you do a lot of typing or while sleeping at night, so wearing a wrist splint can make a significant difference. 
4. Do wrist exercises
Focus on exercises that will stretch the muscles surrounding the wrists to help ensure that the tendons that pass through the carpal tunnel stay in good shape. Include a variety of stretches, bending, and flexing your wrists when doing these exercises. 

5. Use correct posture
Using correct posture while working is important for more than just your back. If you succumb to poor posture on a regular basis, your shoulder nerves tend to be compressed, which ultimately affects your wrists and hands. Make sure that you sit with your back straight and your feet flat on the floor. 
6. Ice your wrists
Ice will help relieve the pain in your wrists and hands. So ice your wrist or soak it in an ice bath for 5 to 10 minutes. While it won't prevent carpal tunnel syndrome, it will alleviate the pain that it causes.
 

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