Occupational asthma due to platinum salts is a frequent disease in platinum refineries. The diagnosis is based upon a history of work related symptoms and a positive skin prick test with platinum salts. Bronchial provocation tests have not been performed in epidemiological studies because the skin test is believed to be highly specific and sensitive. As no reliable data about this issue currently exist, this study assesses the use of skin prick and bronchial provocation tests with methacholine and platinum salt in platinum refinery workers. Twenty seven of 35 workers, who were referred to our clinic with work related symptoms and nine control subjects with bronchial hyperreactivity underwent a skin prick test and bronchial provocation with methacholine and platinum salt. For skin prick and bronchial provocation tests with platinum salt a 102-10' mol/l hexachloroplatinic acid solution, in 10-fold dilutions was used. Four of the 27 subjects and all controls showed neither a bronchial reaction nor a skin reaction. Twenty three subjects were considered allergic to platinum salt; 22 of these showed a fall of 50% or more in specific airway conductance after inhalation of the platinum salt solution. Four workers experienced a positive bronchial reaction despite a negative skin prick test. No correlation of responsiveness to methacholine with responsiveness to platinum salt was found, but the skin prick test correlated with the bronchial reaction to platinum salt (r, = 0 50, p < 0-023, n = 22). One dual reaction was seen in bronchial provocation tests. Side effects of both skin tests and bronchial provocation tests with platinum salt were rare and were not encountered in workers without a skin reaction to platinum salt. It is concluded that bronchial provocation tests with platinum salts should be performed on workers with work related symptoms but negative skin tests with platinum salts.Occupational asthma, rhinitis, conjunctivitis, and eczema are common diseases in platinum refineries'" and catalyst production plants. 7 The prevalence of these symptoms in cross sectional studies is considerably higher than the prevalence of a positive skin prick test with platinum salt (table 1). Thus reliable diagnostic measures are necessary to establish the causal relation between symptoms and exposure to platinum salts. For longitudinal studies quantitative assessment of sensitisation is of interest.In platinum salt allergy in vitro data such as the radioallergosorbent test (RAST)69 13 14 and histamine release from basophils' lack specificity. Binding rates in RAST showed some correlation with total serum IgE activity59 and although some authors found

To guarantee the reliability of densitometric data in clinical trials on pulmonary emphysema a quality control procedure is presented, to prevent that a measured progression in lung density could be reflected by a gradual change in the maintenance of the computed tomographic scanner. For that purpose, a foam phantom has been developed, which mimicks the densities of emphysematous lung tissue, fixed in a sealed Perspex box. Analysis software was developed to automatically compare the density readings with a baseline reference. It was found that this quality control procedure can pick up subtle changes in the scanner of less than 1 hounsfield unit, due to changes in the X-ray tube, detectors, or reconstruction software, and can detect certain imaging artifacts. Therefore, it is recommended that this type of procedure be used to ensure the integrity of densitometric data in longitudinal studies.

A nasal aerosol formulation of ciclesonide with a hydrofluoroalkane propellant (CIC-HFA) is currently in development for treatment of allergic rhinitis (AR). This study evaluated the efficacy and safety of once-daily administration of CIC-HFA 74 or 148 micrograms compared with placebo in patients with seasonal AR (SAR) from mountain cedar pollen. Patients ≥12 years of age with a ≥2-year history of SAR from mountain cedar pollen were randomized in a placebo-controlled, double-blind, parallel group, multicenter study to CIC-HFA 74 micrograms, CIC-HFA 148 micrograms, or placebo once daily in the morning for 2 weeks. Change from baseline in reflective total nasal symptom score (rTNSS), instantaneous TNSS (iTNSS), and reflective total ocular symptom score (rTOSS) in patients with baseline rTOSS ≥5.00 were evaluated. Adverse events (AEs) were monitored throughout the study. A statistically significant improvement in rTNSS (least squares [LS] mean change from baseline 1.04 and 1.02 respectively; p < 0.0001 versus placebo for both) and iTNSS (LS mean change from baseline 0.90 and 0.83 respectively; p < 0.001 vs placebo for both) was observed after treatment with CIC-HFA 74- or 148-microgram doses. Only the CIC-HFA 74-micrograms treatment group showed a statistically significant improvement in rTOSS (LS mean change from baseline 0.52; p = 0.0124) compared with placebo. The overall incidence of AEs was low and comparable between the treatment groups. In this study, statistically significant improvements in nasal symptoms of SAR were observed after treatment with CIC-HFA 74-microgram or CIC-HFA 148-microgram doses. Both active treatments were well tolerated. Clinical trial registry URL and registration number: www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01010971.

Epstein-Barr-virus (EBV)-transformed lymphoblastoid B-cell lines were generated from peripheral blood lymphocytes of 55 patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and 44 healthy relatives. All donors have previously been extensively characterized with regard to clinical, serologic, and genetic parameters. Here, peripheral blood lymphocytes and lines were characterized for cell surface antigens. Furthermore, autoantibody production and proliferation rate of the cell lines were monitored. A significant difference between patients and relatives was the lower proliferation rate of EBV-transformed cell lines of the SLE patients. All SLE cell lines are available for interested researches and can be obtained from the European Cell Bank, Salisbury, UK.