Incontinentia pigmenti: treatment of IP with topical tacrolimus.

Incontinentia pigmenti (IP), or Bloch-Sulzberger syndrome, is a rare X-linked dominant genodermatosis primarily affecting females. Although IP affects many organ systems, the hallmark feature of this disease is its characteristic cutaneous eruption along the lines of Blaschko that evolves through four distinct stages: inflammatory/vesiculobullous, verrucous, hyperpigmented and hypopigmented/ atrophic. We describe a case of IP in its vesicular stage that completely resolved with topical Protopic (tacrolimus) 0.

Local skin burn causes systemic (lung and kidney) endothelial cell injury reflected by increased circulating and decreased tissue factor VIII-related antigen.

Inasmuch as xanthine oxidase (XO)-derived O2* metabolites may contribute to vascular endothelial injury and Factor VIII antigen (F8Ag) is a component of endothelial cells, we hypothesized that XO-derived O2* might damage and cause distant organ endothelial cells to release F8Ag in rats subjected to skin burn. We found that serum F8Ag (ELISA) increased in the blood of rats subjected to skin burn (70 degrees C water to shaved dorsal skin for 30 seconds) but not in sham control rats (30 degrees C water). Coincidentally, F8Ag levels also decreased in lung and kidney tissue sections (immunofluorescent staining) of burned rats but not sham rats.

Xanthine oxidase-derived oxygen radicals induce pulmonary edema via direct endothelial cell injury.

Pulmonary hypoperfusion/ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) may initiate ARDS (nonhydrostatic pulmonary edema). Endothelial damage via xanthine oxidase (XO)-derived oxygen radicals (O2*) may mediate I/R injury. We previously documented Factor VIII antigen (F8) as a marker for endothelial injury.

Optimization of immunohistochemical techniques to detect extracellular matrix proteins in fixed skin specimens.

Complete antigen visualization in the context of well-preserved tissue architecture is the goal of all immunohistochemical techniques. Frozen tissue section techniques achieve optimal antigen visualization but preserve tissue architecture poorly. On the other hand, formalin-fixed tissue section techniques preserve tissue architecture very well but result in antigen masking.