Diagnosis and management of the drug hypersensitivity reactions in Coronavirus disease 19

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a respiratory tract infection caused by a novel human coronavirus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, leads to a wide spectrum of clinical manifestations ranging from asymptomatic cases to patients with mild and severe symptoms, with or without pneumonia. Given the huge influence caused by the overwhelming COVID-19 pandemic affecting over three million people worldwide, a wide spectrum of drugs is considered for the treatment in the concept of repurposing and off-label use. There is no knowledge about the diagnosis and clinical management of the drug hypersensitivity reactions that can potentially occur during the disease. This review brings together all the published information about the diagnosis and management of drug hypersensitivity reactions due to current and candidate off-label drugs and highlights relevant recommendations. Furthermore, it gathers all the dermatologic manifestations reported during the disease for guiding the clinicians to establish a better differential diagnosis of drug hypersensitivity reactions in the course of the disease

Therapy with omalizumab in patients with severe persistant allergic asthma: a real life data in Turkey

Omalizumab is a biologic agent, which has been shown to be effective in clinical trials in allergic, severe asthmatics. The aim of this study was to evaluate the clinical, functional effectiveness, and side effects of omalizumab in real-life conditions respectively. A total of 18 patients (female/male: 11/7) were included to the study. The mean +/- SD age, total IgE, disease duration were 41.8 +/- 11.2 years, 255.1 +/- 197.3 kU/L, 12.8 +/- 9.4 years, respectively. Eight patients had isolated mite, seven patiens had mite + other inhalant allergen, three patients had only other allergen sensitivity. Mean duration of omalizumab treatment (months +/- SD) was 15.1 +/- 8.6 (min-max 1-29) months. Omalizumab dose was 150 mg/month in five patients, 300 mg/month in five, 300 mg/15 days in three, 375 mg/15 days in four, 225 mg/15 days in one patient. Data at the date of last visit were compared with one year prior to omalizumab treatment. Mean systemic steroid dose reduced by 83% (14.7 +/- 14.6 vs. 3.2 +/- 8 mg), number of other asthma medications reduced by 28% (3.6 +/- 1.3 vs. 2.5 +/- 1.3) (p< 0.05). FEV1% values (53.5 +/- 21.2 vs. 64.5 +/- 23.5) did not significantly change. Mean numbers of exacerbations (20 +/- 57.6 vs. 0.4 +/- 0.7), emergency visits (16.5 +/- 46.1 vs. 0.4 +/- 1.2), hospitalizations (2.1 +/- 2.6 vs. 0.1 +/- 0.3) decreased by 93%, 95%, 86%, respectively (p< 0.05). ACT scores increased by 94% (10.4 +/- 3.4 vs. 20.4 +/- 5.7) (p< 0.05). Fifteen patients (88%) were stated as responsive to treatment with omalizumab. Eleven patients (64.8%) stated that their expectations are met, three patients (17.6%) stated that their expectations are close to being met, three patients (17.6%) stated that their expectations are not met. A local side effect was seen in one patient. In conclusion, our data has shown that omalizumab is effective, and safe in severe allergic asthmatics under real-life conditions

Astım-KOAH overlap sendromu

Asthma-COPD overlap syndromeAsthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are common lung diseases characterized by chronic airway inflammation and airway obstruction. Among patient with COPD and asthma; there is a group of patients with an overlap between clinical, functional characteristics and airway inflammation patterns, named ;quot;Asthma-COPD Overlap Syndrome;quot; (ACOS). ACOS is a syndrome characterized by reversible but persistant airflow limitation (postbronchodilator FEV/FVC ;lt; 70%) which has some features of both asthma and COPD. ACOS should be suspected in a patient ;gt; 40 years, with smoking history, previous asthma diagnosis or history of childhood asthma who has persistant airflow limitation and reversible ariway obstruction (defined by an increase of ;gt; %12 of FEV pred or increase of FEV ;gt; 200 mL after inhalation of 400 mcg salbutamol or 1000 mcg terbutaline). The prevalence for ACOS has been reported 11-55% in different case series to date and increases by age and is more frequent in females in different age groups. Patients with ACOS are younger than COPD patients and older than asthma patients. Frequent and severe exacerbations and related hospitalization and emergency room visits are common in ACOS and this causes an impaired quality of life. Current recommendations of guidelines for pharmacologic treatment of ACOS have been composed of a combination with optimal COPD and asthma treatment. Future therapeutic approaches should be based on endotypes. Clinical phenotype and underlying endotype driven clinical studies may be the base of ACOS guidelines.Astım-KOAH overlap sendromuAstım ve kronik obstrüktif akciğer hastalığı (KOAH), kronik hava yolu inflamasyonu ve hava yolu obstrüksiyonu ile karakterize olan ve toplumda sık görülen akciğer hastalıklarıdır. KOAH ve astımlı olgular arasında her iki hastalık için hava yolu inflamasyonunun ve dolayısıyla klinik, fonksiyonel özelliklerin örtüştüğü "Astım-KOAH Overlap Sendromu" (AKOS) olarak tanımlanan hastalar bulunmaktadır. AKOS; persistan hava akımı kısıtlaması (postbronkodilatör FEV/FVC %70) ve reverzibilite ile karakterize, hem astım hem KOAH'ın bazı özelliklerini taşıyan bir sendromdur. Kırk yaş üzeri, sigara içmiş ve çocukluğunda astım öyküsü veya doktor tanılı astımı olan ve persistan hava akımı kısıtlaması ile birlikte reverzibl hava yolu obstüksiyonu (400 mcg salbutamol veya 1000 mcg terbutalin inhalasyonu sonrasında FEV'de bazal değere göre > %12 ve > 200 mL artış) olan hastada AKOS düşünülmelidir. AKOS prevalansı farklı hasta serilerinde %11-55 oranlarında bildirilmektedir. Yaşla birlikte AKOS oranı artmakta ve her yaş diliminde kadınlarda daha sık görülmektedir. AKOS'lu hastaların; KOAH'a göre genç ama astıma göre daha ileri yaşta hastalar olduğu ve daha semptomatik oldukları gösterilmiştir. Sık ve ağır atak geçirme, bu nedenle hastaneye yatış veya acile başvuru AKOS'ta sıktır ve bu durum hastaların yaşam kalitelerini olumsuz yönde etkilemektedir. Rehberlerde AKOS'un farmakolojik tedavisi astım ve KOAH için var olan en uygun tedavi seçeneklerinin kombinasyonundan oluşmaktadır. Gelecekte ortaya çıkacak tedaviler endotipe dayalı olmalıdır. Klinik fenotip ve altta yatan endotipe yönelik yapılacak klinik çalışmalar gelecekte yazılacak AKOS rehberlerinin temelini oluşturacaktır