Publications by authors named "Khalaf Kridin"
Mortality in adult patients with chronic spontaneous urticaria: A real world cohort study.
J Allergy Clin Immunol
December 2024
Background: Chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU), a common and debilitating disease, is widely held not to be life-limiting, but the mortality of CSU has not been investigated.
Objective: To assess all-cause mortality in CSU patients, risk for comorbidities that are leading causes of death and impact of guideline-recommended urticaria treatments on mortality rates.
Methods: This is a retrospective population-based cohort study of electronic health records of 272,190 adult CSU patients and 12,728,913 non-urticaria controls from the US Collaborative TriNetx Analytics Network.
Background: Cardiovascular comorbidity increases morbidity and mortality in psoriasis. Systemic treatments, particularly biologics, are effective in alleviating skin and joint inflammation. Conversely, the impact of systemic therapy on cardiovascular disease risk and mortality in psoriasis remains uncertain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Numerous diseases associated with COVID-19 infection and vaccination have been reported, including conditions such as the autoimmune blistering diseases (AIBD) pemphigus and pemphigoid. However, robust evidence supporting these associations is lacking.
Objective: To investigate the risk of developing AIBD following COVID-19 infection and vaccination.
Article Synopsis
- The study analyzed the long-term safety of dupilumab, a drug for atopic dermatitis (AD), compared to conventional systemic treatments like azathioprine and methotrexate using electronic health records.
- Findings showed that dupilumab had a lower risk of various adverse effects, including infections and type 2 inflammatory diseases, compared to other treatments.
- However, the risk of conjunctivitis was higher in patients treated with dupilumab compared to those on mycophenolate mofetil and methotrexate, prompting the need for further research to confirm these results.
The association of AA with malignancies has been a scope of controversy as the current literature is highly inconsistent in this regard. To evaluate the association between AA and hematological malignancies (HMs) and solid malignancies (SMs) using a large-scale, real-life computerized database. A cross-sectional study was conducted to compare the prevalence of HMs and SMs among patients with AA relative to age-, sex-, and ethnicity-matched control subjects.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe extracellular matrix of most bacterial biofilms contains polysaccharides, proteins, and nucleic acids. These biopolymers have been shown to mediate fundamental biofilm-related phenotypes including surface attachment, intercellular adhesion, and biocide resistance. Enzymes that degrade polymeric biofilm matrix components, including glycoside hydrolases, proteases, and nucleases, are useful tools for studying the structure and function of biofilm matrix components and are also being investigated as potential antibiofilm agents for clinical use.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFArticle Synopsis
- A balanced immune system is crucial for defending against infections and preventing autoimmune diseases; an ineffective response allows infections to thrive, while uncontrolled activation can cause inflammatory disorders.
- Researchers screened 1200 small molecules to find drugs that can modify immune cell functions, focusing on T cells, B cells, and polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMNs) for chronic inflammatory diseases.
- They identified candidate drugs like pyrvinium pamoate, which effectively suppressed B cell activation and slowed down an autoimmune condition, and studied mechanisms in gene-deleted mice to further understand how these actions occur, paving the way for potential drug repurposing to manage immune responses.
Background: There is a long-standing debate if finasteride, a medication used to treat benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and androgenetic alopecia (AGA), can cause psychiatric side effects.
Objective: The goal of this large-scale population-based study was to determine whether finasteride therapy for BPH and AGA is associated with the emergence of mental health conditions.
Methods: This observational case-control study compared the data from patients with BPH who received finasteride 5 mg daily and patients with AGA who received finasteride 1 mg daily with age- and gender-matched controls.
Background: Hematologic malignancies (HMs) are well-known underlying comorbidities of pyoderma gangrenosum (PG). However, studies quantifying the likelihood of PG after HMs are yet to be performed.
Objective: To investigate the bidirectional association between PG and several HMs, namely acute leukemia, chronic leukemia, Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and multiple myeloma.
The cardiovascular risk in bullous pemphigoid: Insights from a population-based study.
Australas J Dermatol
November 2024
Background: The risk of life-threatening major cardiovascular outcomes among patients with bullous pemphigoid (BP) is inconsistent in the current literature.
Objective: To evaluate the risk and prognostic outcomes of myocardial infarction (MI), cerebrovascular accident (CVA), peripheral vascular disease (PVD) and pulmonary embolism (PE) in patients with BP. We additionally aimed to explore the influence of different therapeutic approaches on the risk of these outcomes.
Article Synopsis
- - **Study Overview**: This research examined the risk of developing psoriatic arthritis (PsA) among different types of psoriasis, taking into account factors like sex and ethnicity, using a large database of electronic health records (EHRs).
- - **Key Findings**: Psoriasis vulgaris (Pso) was linked to the highest PsA risk, followed by generalized pustular psoriasis (GPP) and pustulosis palmoplantaris (PPP). The study also found that female and White patients with Pso were at greater risk for developing PsA compared to their male and Black counterparts, respectively.
- - **Implications**: The findings underline the importance of considering sex and ethnicity in assessing PsA risk
A knowledge gap exists regarding the association between vitiligo and rheumatoid arthritis (RA) due to the absence of large-scale cohort studies designed to investigate this association. To investigate the bidirectional epidemiological association between vitiligo and RA. A population-based study was conducted using Clalit Health Services (CHS) database (2002-2019) using both a cohort study and a case-control study design.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Our knowledge about the association between vitiligo and Parkinson's disease (PD) is sparse. We sought to investigate the bidirectional epidemiological association between vitiligo and PD.
Methods: A population-based study was conducted using Clalit Health Services (CHS) database (2002-2019) using both a cohort study and a case-control study design.
Article Synopsis
- * The study found that patients using systemic corticosteroids had a hazard ratio (HR) of 1.43 for increased mortality and 1.33 for MACE, while the risks of relapse were lower with systemic treatment (HR 0.85).
- * The research utilized a rigorous methodology with propensity score matching and sensitivity analyses, although it noted potential limitations in the data sources.
Background: The commensal skin bacterium plays a role in the pathogenesis of acne vulgaris and also causes opportunistic infections of implanted medical devices due to its ability to form biofilms on biomaterial surfaces. Poly--(1→6)--acetyl-D-glucosamine (PNAG) is an extracellular polysaccharide that mediates biofilm formation and biocide resistance in a wide range of bacterial pathogens. The objective of this study was to determine whether produces PNAG, and whether PNAG contributes to biofilm formation and biocide resistance .
View Article and Find Full Text PDFArticle Synopsis
- During the COVID-19 pandemic, dermatologists faced challenges in assessing nail psoriasis via teledermatology, particularly when patients also had other nail issues like onychotillomania and onychophagy.
- The study evaluated patients with nail psoriasis over 9 months, comparing the Nijmegen-Nail psoriasis Activity Index (N-NAIL) with a new tool, Galeazzi-Nail psoriasis Activity Index (GN-NAIL), to improve severity rating and treatment monitoring.
- The findings indicated that GN-NAIL effectively scored nail psoriasis severity even in complicated cases, showing solid consistency and correlation in assessments across different clinical settings.
Background: Prurigo nodularis (PN) presents with intensely itchy hard nodules. Despite being limited to the skin, PN was noted to be associated with systemic diseases including diabetes and chronic renal failure. In previous smaller retrospective studies, several cardiac and vascular diseases were found more frequently in patients with PN.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF