A prospective open study of the efficacy of high-dose recombinant hepatitis B rechallenge vaccination in HIV-infected patients.

Double-dose hepatitis B virus revaccination of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected patients proved to be effective in 50.7% of 144 patients who had previously failed to respond to standard doses. In the multivariate analysis, female patients were found to have a significantly better response (P= .03). The effect of age on the response depended on the viral load at the time of revaccination. For patients with a detectable HIV RNA load, the effect of age was stronger (odds ratio [OR], 0.34 per 10 years older [95% confidence interval {CI}, 0.16-0.72]; P= .005) than for patients with an undetectable HIV RNA load (OR, 0.74 per 10 years older [95% CI, 0.50-1.09]; P= .12).