Timing Meningococcal Vaccines in gMG: Challenges and Considerations

Announcer:
This is Neurofrontiers on ReachMD. Today, we’ll hear from Dr. Michael Weiss, who’s a Professor of Neurology at the University of Washington in Seattle. He shared his insights on the meningococcal vaccination for patients with generalized myasthenia gravis at the AANEM 2025 Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Let’s hear from Dr. Weiss now.

Dr. Weiss:
Well, the meningococcal vaccination requirements have really been a work in progress, and we were all struggling. And if you ask five different neuromuscular neurologists, they might give you five different answers about what to do. The Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices has since changed their recommendations, which the CDC has mirrored, and they want all of the vaccinations to be done prior to the initiation of therapy, which is extremely hard to do.

So some people in my field—some experts—are giving the vaccinations right from the get-go. They see the patient for the first time, and they start the vaccination series, even if they're not going to start them on a complement inhibitor, with the presumption that they might. But they might not. I don't do that. I give them two-series first and initiate treatment but put them on antibiotics all the way up to six months, so they get that last meningococcal B vaccination. It's not ideal, but until the ACIP changes its recommendations, that's what I plan to do.

Announcer:
That was Dr. Michael Weiss discussing considerations for giving generalized myasthenia gravis patients the meningococcal vaccination. To access this and other episodes in our series, visit Neurofrontiers on ReachMD.com, where you can Be Part of the Knowledge. Thanks for listening!