1 Fleming DM, Crombie DL. Prevalence of asthma and hayfever in England and Wales. BMJ 1987;294:279-83. 2 Strachen DP. Hayfever and household size. BMJ 1989;299:1259-60. 3 Frick OL. Effect of respiratory and other virus infections on IgE immunoregulation. J Allergy Clin Immunol 1986;78:1013-8. 4 Welliver RC, Kaul TN, Ogra PL. The appearance of cell-bound IgE in respiratory tract epithelium after...

Methods and results: fifty-seven (57) patients with a well-documented history of seasonal grass pollen allergy were evaluated in a DBPC trial over a period of 10 months (January to November 1995) with a view to investigating the efficacy and safety of sublingual immunotherapy with a grass pollen extract, 9,500 BU/ml. The course of treatment consisted of an incremental phase of approximately 3 w...

The incidence of ocular allergy varies in different geographical regions and tends to be more common in countries with warm climates. In the US, as much as 40% of the general population suffered from allergic conjunctivitis.2-4 In one study of 5000 allergic children, 32% had ocular symptoms as the single manifestation of their allergies.5 A recently published prevalence study in Japan has found...

Allergic diseases are on the rise in Asia. Aeroallergen exposure is a strong risk factor for sensitization, development and severity of atopic diseases, especially in the Asian paediatric population. Geographical and seasonal variations in aeroallergen sensitization are seen even within Asian countries and changes in aeroallergen sensitization patterns have been observed over time. Some possibl...

a total of 65 pollen types were identified from two years atmospheric pollen survey in the environmental conditions of south assam. out of them, eight pollen types viz., acacia auriculiformis, amaranthus spinosus, cassia alata, cleome gynandra, cocos nucifera, imperata cylindrica, ricinus communis and trewia nudiflora, were selected for biochemical studies on the basis of their dominance in the...

House dust mites are widely distributed in the human habitat and work environment and produce very powerful allergens. The most important allergy-causing mites found in homes worldwide are the house dust mites Dermatophagoides farinae and D. pteronyssinus and the storage mite Blomia tropicalis. It is important to know which mite species are present in a geographical area when performing diagnos...

Grass pollen is a very common cause of allergic rhinitis and asthma. The only treatment targeting the underlying causes of allergy is immunotherapy (IT). Sublingual immunotherapy (SLIT) has been introduced to solve the problem of systemic reactions to subcutaneous IT (SCIT). This article evaluates the characteristics of the allergen extract, Staloral, in terms of practical administration, effec...

The synthesis of clinical trials of sublingual immunotherapy for grass pollen allergy by Di Bona et al1 in this issue indicates an unimpressive small effect, and the efficacy is even smaller in the United States compared with European populations. However, what was impressive is the 70.0% (1817 of 2597 patients) proportion experiencing adverse effects (mostly mouth itching or burning and gastro...