Brief Answer:
Made from pooled human plasma.

Detailed Answer:
Hi,

Welcome to Healthcare Magic!

Gamastan is a preparation of human gamma immunoglobulins used to provide passive immunity in diseases like hepatitis A, measles, varicella and rubella.

There are two types of immunoglobulin preparations, normal and specific. Normal human immunoglobulins are derived from the pooled plasma of blood donors. They contain antibody to microbial agents which are prevalent in the general population. Specific immunoglobulin preparations are obtained from pooled blood donations from patients convalescing from the relevant infection, donors recently vaccinated with the relevant vaccine, or those who, on screening, have been found to have sufficiently high antibody concentrations. These blood-derived specific immunoglobulins therefore contain concentrations of antibody to an individual organism or toxin at a higher titre than would be present in normal
immunoglobulin preparations. For example, for controlling varicells, while normal immunoglobulin like Gamastan can be used but better results can be obtained with specific varicella immunoglobulin.

Since Gamastan and other normal immunoglobulin preparations are prepared from pooled plasma of thousands of donors, the entire array of antibodies usually found in normal serum is represented in the preparation. Normal pooled immunoglobulin contains sufficiently high antibody concentrations to be effective against hepatitis A and measles. But of the donors, some may have been vaccinated against measles or some may have had the clinical infection. There may have been some donors who never had either clinical disease or vaccination, but this is rare.


Best wishes.

Dr Preeti Parakh
MD Psychiatry

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