
Exposure and allergic sensitization to cockroach was associated with a significantly greater risk of asthma hospitalization and greater healthcare utilization among 476 children aged 4 to 9 years who participated in the National Cooperative Inner-City Asthma Study. Allergic sensitization to the mold Alternaria has been identified as a significant allergen in terms of increasing airway hyperresponsiveness and was associated with a nearly 200-fold increased risk of respiratory arrest due to asthma, emphasizing the importance of determining underlying allergic sensitivities in patients with asthma and providing patients with accurate and practical advice on allergen avoidance techniques. (more…)
Sensitization to pets remains a risk factor for asthma and rhinitis, and can occur in people who have never lived with a pet. S ...
The two strongest risk factors for asthma in childhood are a family history and immediate hypersensitivity to common allergens. ...
More severe asthma can persist from childhood into adulthood without remission. Another important tendency in the natural histo ...
Natural history studies with the following design features provide a firm epidemiologic foundation for risk factor assessments and ...
In the Tucson CRS study, about 50% of young children experienced a period of recurrent wheezing and/or coughing in the first 6 ...

One especially favored target for immune recognition is bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS). This macromolecule is found only in the outer lipid bilayer that surrounds the cell walls of gram-negative bacteria, such as Neisseria, Salmonella, and Escherichia coli. Each molecule of bacterial lipopolysaccharide consists of a core carbohydrate linked on one side to a phospholipid (called lipid A) that is anchored in the bilayer and on the other side to a long polysaccharide chain (called the O sidechain) that extends outward from the bacterial surface (Figure 1 bellow). The sequence of sugars making up the O sidechain is species-specific and highly variable, even within a single bacterial genus: For example, more than 1000 variants in Salmonella are known. (more…)
Toll-like receptors (TLRs) act as receptors for numerous stimuli of immune cells, including bacterial cell wall constituents (l ...
Bacteria cause allergic disease because of toxicity, invasiveness, immunopathology, or lends of these three mechanisms. Thus much ...
Exotoxins are noxious proteins secreted by many bacteria. These toxins are often heat-labile and thus can be heat-inactivated f ...
A few of the best known humoral effectors of innate immunity are listed in Table 1 bellow, along with the types of target molec ...
Breast milk contains a variety of bioactive substances, among them soluble CD14 (sCD14), which plays an important role in innat ...

CD14 is part of the receptor complex for endotoxin, which is a component of tobacco smoke. The CD14 gene is located on chromosome 5q, a region previously demonstrated to be linked to asthma when stratified for smoke exposure. This study was designed to extend these findings by determining whether polymorphisms in the CD14 gene are related to this gene–environment interaction on asthma. Puerto Rican (n = 362 trios) and Mexican (n = 259 trios) families ascertained through a child with asthma were studied. (more…)
This study sought to determine the influence of passive exposure to tobacco smoke during childhood on the results of genetic linkag ...
The Tcell Ig domain and mucin domain (TIM) proteins, the genes for which are located on chromosome 5q, have been suggested to b ...
Although ADAM33 was the first gene identified by positional cloning to underlie the risk factor of asthma, attempts to replicate th ...
A previous genome-wide screen for mite-sensitive atopic dermatitis asthma in Japanese families indicated linkage to chromosome 5q33 ...
Increasing evidence demonstrates that cytokines of Th1 and Th2 cells play important roles in allergic disorders. This study exa ...

Topical corticosteroids are the usual therapy for patients with atopic dermatitis, but prolonged use can result in skin atrophy and other side effects. The long-term safety and efficacy of tacrolimus would prove an attractive alternative. Long-term treatment with 0.1% tacrolimus ointment is significantly more efficacious than a corticosteroid ointment regimen in adults with moderate to severe atopic dermatitis. (more…)
Topical corticosteroids are the usual therapy for patients with atopic dermatitis, but prolonged use can result in skin atrophy ...
The pharmacokinetics of pimecrolimus cream 1% and tacrolimus ointment 0.1% in adults with extensive, moderate to severe atopic ...
Atopic Dermatitis is a chronic relapsing skin disease. Several investigations concerning the long-term prognosis of Atopic Derm ...
Atopic dermatitis is a chronic inflammatory condition of the skin which usually starts in infancy. It is sometimes called ‘atop ...
Atopic Dermatitis is considered to be one of the first manifestations in the atopic march. The aim of this study was to investi ...
Asthma is characterized by Th2-dominant cytokine profiles. The risk of developing asthma is lower in children attending day care in the first year of life. Therefore, this study was conducted to assess the interaction between day-care attendance, T-cell cytokine profiles and atopic phenotypes in early childhood. Children (n = 208) in the Childhood Onset of Asthma (COAST) study were genotyped for 72 polymorphisms in 45 immune response genes. The COAST cohort was selected on the basis of a high risk of asthma. Measurements of IFN-y (Th1), IL-5 and IL-13 (Th2), and IL-10 (Treg) were made at birth and at age 1 year and the children were stratified by day-care attendance. Wheeze and atopic dermatitis phenotypes were documented in the first year. (more…)
CD14 is part of the receptor complex for endotoxin, which is a component of tobacco smoke. The CD14 gene is located on chromoso ...
The genetics of asthma will be discussed only in the context of environmental exposures. In general, the identification of nove ...
This study sought to determine the influence of passive exposure to tobacco smoke during childhood on the results of genetic linkag ...
A general pattern of factors influencing development of asthma seems to be emerging, including family allergy history/ asthma g ...
The T-bet (T-box 21) gene (TBX21) encodes a transcription factor, T-box expressed in T cells, which has been implicated in asthma t ...
This study examined the genetic basis of sensitization to house dust mite allergy allergens. A genome scan was conducted using 603 microsatellite markers in 82 nuclear families (366 individuals) of German, British and Portuguese origin with at least two affected siblings. Sensitization to Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus was assessed by determining specific IgE antibody levels detected by immunochemiluminometric assay and immunosorbent assay and categorized as positive or negative relative to a predetermined cut-off point. (more…)
Allergic rhinitis and asthma are common comorbidities. Like asthma, the presence of a genetic component in allergic rhinitis ha ...
Many people are under impression that allergy and asthma disease had genetic or heredity factors playing major role as medium o ...
Atopic Dermatitis is considered to be one of the first manifestations in the atopic march. The aim of this study was to investi ...
CD14 is part of the receptor complex for endotoxin, which is a component of tobacco smoke. The CD14 gene is located on chromoso ...
The manifestations of asthma and allergy are the result of both genetic predisposition and environmental factors. This relation ...

Topical corticosteroids are the usual therapy for patients with atopic dermatitis, but prolonged use can result in skin atrophy and other side effects. The long-term safety and efficacy of tacrolimus ointment would prove an attractive alternative. Long-term treatment with 0.1% tacrolimus ointment is significantly more efficacious than a corticosteroid ointment regimen in adults with moderate to severe atopic dermatitis. (more…)
Topical corticosteroids are the usual therapy for patients with atopic dermatitis, but prolonged use can result in skin atrophy ...
The pharmacokinetics of pimecrolimus cream 1% and tacrolimus ointment 0.1% in adults with extensive, moderate to severe atopic ...
Atopic Dermatitis is a chronic relapsing skin disease. Several investigations concerning the long-term prognosis of Atopic Derm ...
Atopic dermatitis is a chronic inflammatory condition of the skin which usually starts in infancy. It is sometimes called ‘atop ...
Atopic Dermatitis is considered to be one of the first manifestations in the atopic march. The aim of this study was to investi ...

In asthma, the secretory phospholipases A2 (sPLA2) have been implicated in the release of arachidonic acid from cellular membranes, the generation of lysophospholipids, the sPLA2-mediated activation of cellular PLA2 (cPLA2) with increased Leukotriene Receptor Antagonist synthesis, and the breakdown of surfactant. In this double-blind, placebo-controlled, random-order crossover study, a potent inhibitor of sPLA2, LY333013, was assessed. (more…)
Marimastat is a synthetic broad-spectrum matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) inhibitor. This study assessed the anti-inflammatory effect ...
Asthma is a common condition among pregnant women and the use of inhaled corticosteroids has been associated with an increased ...
Roflumilast is an oral, once-daily inhibitor of phosphodiesterase type 4 (PDE4) that prevents the breakdown of cyclic adenosine ...
Roflumilast is an oral, once-daily PDE4 inhibitor with antiinflammatory activity in development for the treatment of asthma. Ro ...
Tumour Necrosis Factor is a pro-inflammatory cytokine implicated in the pathogenesis of asthmatic airway inflammation, hyper-react ...
Two factors thought to influence the risk factor asthma are the promoting effect of sensitization to house dust mites and the preventive effect of increased omega-3 fatty acids. Although the avoidance of house dust mites allergen has been used as a preventive strategy in several trials, the effect of omega-3 fatty acid supplementation in the primary prevention of asthma and allergic disease is not known. (more…)
To prevent the development of allergy, allergen avoidance has to be instituted before sensitization has occurred. The specific ...
Asthma and allergic diseases are common in both children and adults. Their development depends on an interaction between asthma ...
Allergen exposure plays a role in the development of asthma bronchial hyper-responsiveness and in the acute inflammatory response ...
Exposure to allergens plays a role in the development of BHR and in the chronic inflammatory response seen in asthmatic patients. R ...
Avoidance of any one of the individual risk factors associated with childhood asthma has not been successful in preventing its deve ...
Avoidance of any one of the individual risk factors associated with childhood asthma has not been successful in preventing its development. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a multifaceted intervention programme for the primary prevention of asthma in high-risk infants at 7 years of age. Five hundred and forty-five high-risk infants with an immediate family history of asthma and allergies were prospectively randomized into intervention and control groups pre-natally. (more…)
The authors investigated whether environmental control during pregnancy and early life affects sensitization and lung function at t ...
Two factors thought to influence the risk factor asthma are the promoting effect of sensitization to house dust mites and the preve ...
The prevalence of atopic dermatitis is increasing in Western societies. The hygiene hypothesis proposes that this is due to red ...
To prevent the development of allergy, allergen avoidance has to be instituted before sensitization has occurred. The specific ...
Exposure to allergens plays a role in the development of BHR and in the chronic inflammatory response seen in asthmatic patients. R ...

