![Filtering Out False-positive Drug Allergies]()
In a study published online on November 23 in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In Practice, senior author Elina Jerschow, M.D., and lead author Melissa Iammatteo, M.D., describe a safe way to determine whether patients are truly allergic to medications. Their study involved 229 Montefiore Drug Allergy Clinic patients with previously reported allergic drug reactions. The most commonly reported allergies were to penicillins (71 percent) and to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (18 percent). Each patient received a dose of placebo, followed by a one-tenth dose of the drug they allegedly were allergic to, and then a full dose of same drug. Only four percent of patients had objective allergic reactions during challenges, none of which were life-threatening. Nine percent of patients reacted to the placebos, all of them women with multiple reported drug allergies. Dr. Jerschow is associate professor of medicine and attending physician at Montefiore.
Posted on: Wednesday, December 14, 2016