COVID vaccines appear safe for people with IBD

THURSDAY, June 10, 2021 (HealthDay News) – Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines appear to be safe for people with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), according to a new study.

IBD, which includes Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, are chronic illnesses caused by an over-responsive intestinal immune system, leading to chronic diarrhea and other digestive symptoms.

In this study, researchers examined 246 adult patients with IBD in a U.S. registry for COVID-19 vaccines.

As in the general population, the most common side effects of the two COVID-19 vaccines in patients with IBD included: pain and swelling at the injection site, followed by fatigue, headache and dizziness, fever and chills, and gastrointestinal symptoms. Most of the side effects were mild and only lasted a few days.

Only a few of the IBD patients reported serious side effects – most commonly fatigue, fever, and headache – and only two reported severe gastrointestinal symptoms.

Many IBD patients were concerned that the COVID-19 vaccination would worsen their condition, but the vast majority of gastrointestinal symptoms in these patients were temporary and resolved on their own, according to the study recently published in the American Journal of Gastroenterology.

About 80% of the study participants were on advanced therapies that suppress the body’s immune response, and this dampening of the immune system may partly explain why patients taking these drugs had a slightly lower number of side effects from the vaccine than people in the general population, suggested study author Dr. Gil Melmed, director of clinical research in inflammatory bowel disease at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

“A lot of these adverse events could actually be due to the immune system’s reaction to the vaccine,” Melmed said in a press release from the hospital. “So you may not have such a strong reaction to a vaccine if you are taking drugs that modulate parts of your immune system.”

The study shows that “if you have IBD, the side effects you are likely to experience after a vaccine are no different from anyone else,” said Melmed. “If you are being treated with advanced therapies such as biologics, these side effects might even be milder. So don’t let that be a reason why you don’t get the vaccine.”

More information

The Mayo Clinic has more on IBD.

SOURCE: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, press release, June 9, 2021