Immune senescence and vaccination in the elderly.

Vaccines are powerful public health tools that have been of tremendous benefit in protecting vulnerable populations worldwide from many pathogens. However, vaccine- preventable diseases still remain a considerable burden and this is particularly true among aging and aged populations in industrialized countries. The predicted demographic shift in the population landscape towards an ever-increasing aging population and the evidence suggesting that older individuals mount less-than optimal immune response to vaccination have raised the question of improving vaccine responses in older individuals. This review presents recent progress in the understanding at the cellular and molecular levels of age related immune decline and strategies to translate current knowledge into the development of immunization strategies to promote healthy aging, keeping older members of our society autonomous and independent.

Merits of using color and shape differentiation to improve the speed and accuracy of drug strength identification on over-the-counter medicines by laypeople.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to examine the utility of using color and shape to differentiate drug strength information on over-the-counter medicine packages. Medication errors are an important threat to patient safety, and confusions between drug strengths are a significant source of medication error. METHOD: A visual search paradigm required laypeople to search for medicine packages of a particular strength from among distracter packages of different strengths, and measures of reaction time and error were recorded. RESULTS: Using color to differentiate drug strength information conferred an advantage on search times and accuracy. Shape differentiation did not improve search times and had only a weak effect on search accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: Using color to differentiate drug strength information improves drug strength identification performance. Color differentiation of drug strength information may be a useful way of reducing medication errors and improving patient safety.