I had my first dose of the Astra Zeneca on January 30. 6 weeks later I used Testing for All's £49 antibody test kit.
The results came back negative, I have no antibodies. Also presumably I have no working white cells.
I'm gutted and can only hope either the antibody test was defective or the second dose kicks them into action.
Testing after second shot is recommended. Try few weeks after your second one. 🙏
While CLL can drive T-cells to exhaustion, you may get some T-cell protection. It's just much harder to test. Also, as GMa27 noted, the real test is the antibodies measurable a few weeks after your second shot.
Thank you for that. Makes me feel a bit better.
Hi Shornof,I too tested negative on 5th March (with Testing for All) and I know how disappointed you are.
I spoke to my consultant last week and he also felt that 'all is not lost' and that we may still get a milder reaction to covid, if we catch it. He also recommended being tested a few weeks after the second shot which I will do 🤞🏼🤞🏼🤞🏼
Hi like you also had test with Testing For All six weeks post vaccine and results came back no antibodies. Was gutted also. I've just had 2nd vaccine and was looking to get test again at appropriate time. However my consultant doesn't feel these test to be very effective so not about to have test. If they're not definite it defeats the object and can create unnecessary concerns. Hope this makes you feel a little better. Just have to cont with all precautionary measures and hope further down the line there is a test that is conclusive.
Shingrix vaccine is effective on CLL patients, why would the Covid vaccine be effective?
Testing for All is marketing this test in the UK as a "COVID-19 Immunity Tracker
Measure your protective antibodies to coronavirus
This easy to use finger prick test can be used to detect previous exposure, and to accurately measure the level of IgG antibodies to the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 to get a better understanding of your immune response. This test measures the immune response following both vaccination and natural infection" (emphasis mine)
This is the Roche Elecsys Anti-SARS-COV-2 S test, which is one of the more accurate tests out there, according to the FDA.
The question marks over your result are:
1. As noted above, antibody levels should peak about 3 weeks after your second dose of vaccine.
2. Contrary to Testing for All's marketing blurb, Roche does not claim this test measures antibody response to vaccine.
3. Per fda.gov/media/144035/download
"You should not interpret the results of this test as an indication or degree of immunity or protection from reinfection".
Thank you. That was very interesting. I think Testing for All may be telling porkies. (I am only alleging this not stating as fact, lawyers) I shall ask Testing for All about it.
I would be interested in what they come back with. Feel they have misled, and targated people who are vulnerable. It seems no coincidence that 3 people on this site have used this company, myself being one of them and all showing no antibodies.
I have had no reply yet. Because of their result I rang the docs saying I was suffering from fatigue (I have ME/CFS) and wondered if this fatigue was caused by CLL.
They rang straight back and called me in for a blood test. The results are back:
My CLL is stable. My Neutrophils are fine so I probably have a normal set of antibodies to the vaccine.
😀😀😄 Feeling very positive, if tired and wobbly, but that is just ME and I can live with that.
Frankly, I have never heard of a commercially available test (or even research grade) that can measure degree of immunity (in any coherent form) after a COVID vaccine. The “real life” immune response is way to complicated to measure.
I don’t think aside from doing a post-post clinical trial can you determine immunity for any population (including CLL-ers). You’d have to take a few thousand vaccinated people and see if over time many developed COVID or not.
There was a webinar run by CLL Support last week. During it Professor Peter Hillmen was asked a question about home test kits for antibody response to the Covid vaccines.
It is worth watching when it appears on the website. My interpretation of his comments is that at best it only shows part of the story as home test kits do not look for T Cell activation. The test kits also do not state how deeply they look. So, can they spot one in 10,000, one in 1,000 or do they need even more to spot antibodies?
You have to draw your own conclusions on the comments. My personal view, I’m not going to ‘invest’ in one (or two) but I will trust the results coming out of the Birmingham study.
best to all, rob
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