Advertisements posted across campus are requesting student volunteers as test subjects for drugs not yet approved by the Federal Food and Drug Administration.

The flyers often offer payment of up to a few hundred dollars, and ask for participants who are as young as 18. Some students are participating in the studies, despite that these, in some cases, involve the risk of uncomfortable side effects.

A current advertisement for an investigational vaccine to prevent genital herpes has captured the attention of some young women at SF State, 75 of whom are now participating in the study.

The herpes study, conducted by the National Institute of Health, requires a 20-month commitment from women 18 to 30 years old. After an initial screening is conducted to make sure the women do not have the herpes virus, they return for eight visits. At three of the visits the health care providers administer the vaccine, and on the seventh visit, they take blood samples.

When psychology major Sarah Dardick heard of the test, she considered becoming involved.

“I thought, one more vaccine for one more virus could lead to many being cured down the road,” Dardick said. “Plus, that’s one more thing to be immunized against.”

But as she considered becoming a volunteer, her friends discouraged her, saying there could be serious side effects. Ultimately, she decided not to participate because transportation to the clinic was too much of a bother, she said.

The investigational hepatitis A vaccine, which The National Institute on Health is using in this study to test its effectiveness on herpes, has been given to millions of people. It cannot give a person herpes, and is believed to be about 60 percent effective in preventing the spread of genital herpes, said representatives from the study’s San Francisco clinic.

Crystal Rivera, 21, received her first vaccination last year. After doing careful research, she decided
she would like to become involved in the study.

“I just felt good about it,” she said. “It was something I could do to help the medical community.”
Rivera had experienced fatigue the first week of the study, but she has not had any other negative side effects. She said she would encourage others to do it.

“It is a good thing,” she said “You will be helping future people not to have to deal with the stress of herpes, and not have to deal with the fear of it.”

Based on a licensed hepatitis A vaccine, the vaccine used in this study is considered investigational because it will be given at a lower dose and in a smaller volume than the normal hepatitis A vaccine.

The herpes vaccine is generally well-tolerated, said Sabina Pfister, one of the registered nurses and a clinical research coordinator for the herpes test. The San Francisco clinic has enrolled about 80 people, and there have only been two incidences of a participant having a fever, she said.

“Soreness of the arm is the most common side effect, and we haven’t seen a lot of nausea,” Pfister said. “It’s not going to affect you in any way that would make you miss a class.”

The most common side effects associated with the vaccine are soreness at the injection site, redness, swelling or hardening, headache, fatigue, fever, loss of appetite and nausea, according to the study’s Web site. However, these symptoms usually did not last more than 24 hours, nor did they prevent the volunteers' “normal daily activities,” it said.

“I know these tests need volunteers,” added Dardick. “If it were a break from school or something, maybe I would still do it. I just can’t afford to get sick during the school year.”

The genital herpes vaccine study in particular is important because about one out of four adult American women has genital herpes, and women who have it are made very susceptible to the transmission of HIV because of the open sores that appear during periodic outbreaks, clinic representatives said.

The SF State Student Health Center does not advise students whether to participate in clinical studies or not.

“Generally, side effects in these studies are not going to be serious,” said health educator Albert Angelo. “We have an overall policy to promote (students’) health.

“We are not taking a position, just telling students to get as much information as they can to make an informed decision.”

Dardick said she believes clinical trials are generally a good thing.

“When it comes to testing, unfortunately it is a necessary reality,” she said. “It’s really the only way without getting ethics involved.”