The effect of regular versus on-demand desloratadine treatment in children with allergic rhinitis.

Objective: Desloratadine is a potent antihistamine. Whether regular or on-demand use of desloratadine influences its therapeutic efficacy in allergic rhinitis is unknown. The aim of the study was to compare the clinical efficacy and the anti-inflammatory activity of regularly administered desloratadine to its on-demand use in children with allergic rhinitis due to pollen allergy.

The relationship between serum selenium levels and frequent wheeze in children.

As an antioxidant, selenium stimulates Th1 immune response against viral infections, and may play a role in the pathogenesis of frequent wheeze due to respiratory viral infections during the first year of life. We investigated the level of selenium in children with frequent wheeze who had no atopic diseases and no family history of atopy to determine whether selenium has an effect on the severity of the diseases. Sixty-one children with frequent wheeze who were in the asymptomatic period and had had no infectious disease for two months and an equal number of age- and sex-matched children, as a control group, without atopy or allergy or systemic diseases were enrolled in the study.

The effects of grass pollen allergoid immunotherapy on clinical and immunological parameters in children with allergic rhinitis.

Allergoid immunotherapy is a new form of allergen immunotherapy allowing safe administration of high allergen doses. There is limited information on the effects of allergoid immunotherapy in children with allergic rhinitis. To investigate the immunological and clinical effects of allergoid immunotherapy in children with allergic rhinitis due to grass pollen allergy.

Are risk factors of childhood asthma predicting disease persistence in early adulthood different in the developing world?

Background: Predictive factors of childhood asthma for favorable prognosis may differ between populations where a variety of genetic and environmental factors are present.

Objectives: To document the factors predicting disease persistence in early adulthood in Turkey.

Methods: An outpatient cohort (n = 115) with a mean follow-up duration of 11.