Blogs

What is happening with eczema innovation on the East Coast?

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Tue, 05/07/2013 - 7:43pm

Eczema doesn’t respect national borders. It’s something hundreds of millions of people around the world live with. As a patient and blogger I like to keep up with advances made around the world. I have my Google Alerts set up and other feeds open for information. At times it can seem like the world is flat and stuff is happening everywhere at once.

But is it true? Are research advances being made everywhere? The natural way for a reporter or blogger to proceed is to learn about hotspots of innovation and then pay attention to those hotspots.

Tags: 
eczema
Research
innovation
east coast
Eczema Map Project

Antibody therapy: an experimental eczema treatment

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Thu, 11/01/2012 - 10:40pm

For patients with extreme cases of eczema, a number of small trials worldwide hint at a possible future therapy.

Tags: 
eczema
therapy
IgE
omalizumab

Importance of Patient Education

Submitted by Garibyan_Huang
on Wed, 10/31/2012 - 5:29pm

We learned from our last blog posting that eczema is a chronic disease.  Unfortunately there is no magic pill or treatment for chronic diseases, and there is no cure. Patients with any type of chronic disease learn about lifetime management of the symptoms associated with their disease. Therefore, chronic diseases need long lasting management plans tailored for each individual patient for the disease state that they are in.

We are fortunate that novel research in the area of atopic dermatitis has led to the discovery of many new management approaches, drugs and regimens.

Tags: 
Research
Atopic Dermatitis
Alternatives

Allergy tests for eczema a complex, controversial topic

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Tue, 09/04/2012 - 9:19pm

People with eczema—or parents of children with eczema—often suspect that food allergies are somehow setting off eczema flares. But nailing down exactly which foods cause trouble is made difficult by the many other factors that can trigger eczema. Such triggers include emotional or physical stress, environment, and viral or bacterial infection. Recently I spoke on the phone to Jon Hanifin, a professor of dermatology and clinician at Oregon Health Sciences University and NEA board member, to find out whether allergy tests can truly benefit eczema patients.

Tags: 
eczema
allergy
Allergies
allergy tests
food
food allergy
Food Allergies

Dermatology Physicians Residents - Perspectives on Eczema

Submitted by Garibyan_Huang
on Thu, 08/09/2012 - 5:08pm

We first learned about atopic dermatitis while studying medicine at Harvard Medical School.  It was introduced to us during dermatology lectures where photos of mostly young children where shown with uncomfortable and itchy appearing rashes.  At that time, this was another disease that we had to learn and memorize the symptoms and the diagnostic criteria for our exams.  

This all changed a few years ago after we started residency and rotated through pediatric dermatology at Children’s Hospital Boston when we actually got to see and interact with the patients and family members of those

Tags: 
Children
Flare-ups
Atopic Dermatitis
Bathing
Symptoms
Triggers
Treatments

Novel smallpox vaccine should be safe for eczema patients

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Wed, 07/11/2012 - 8:10pm

The US government has ordered 20 million doses of a vaccine that should protect eczema patients from smallpox without exposing them to the risk of developing eczema vaccinatum, a life-threatening infection, according to a press release by the vaccine’s manufacturer, the Danish biotechnology company Bavarian Nordic.

This means that, in the event of a smallpox bioterror attack, instead of relying on the dubious security of herd immunity, people like you and me can get vaccinated. Until the advent of this new vaccine, we could not.

Eczema vaccinatum made the headlines in 2007 when an

Tags: 
Smallpox
vaccine
eczema
vaccinia
eczema vaccinatum

Repurposed drug could repair the skin barrier

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Tue, 06/26/2012 - 10:16pm

Lisa Beck, a professor of dermatology at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC), will soon begin an NIH-funded clinical trial of Actos (pioglitazone), a drug often prescribed for diabetics, which may turn out to strengthen the skin barrier and reduce symptoms for eczema patients.

Actos, made by Takeda Pharmaceuticals and already approved by the FDA in pill form, could appear unofficially on the market for eczema therapy much sooner than a new drug discovered from scratch.

"Experts sometimes use off-label drugs to treat patients with moderate to severe eczema or atopic

Tags: 
Actos
skin barrier
new drug
repurposed drug
Rochester

Well-moisturized infants less likely to develop eczema

Submitted by Spanish Key
on Sun, 05/27/2012 - 5:52am

Parents who apply moisturizer to their newborns may be able to protect them from developing eczema, a group of American and British researchers report in a new study.

Tags: 
infants
Moisturizing
prevention
barrier