Clinical efficacy of autologous plasma therapy for atopic dermatitis.

BACKGROUND: The clinical efficacy of autologous blood therapy (ABT) in patients with atopic dermatitis (AD) was demonstrated by a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled study. To characterize the blood component mediating the therapeutic efficacy of ABT for AD, we evaluated the clinical efficacy of autologous plasma therapy (APT) and autologous high-molecular-weight plasma protein fraction therapy (AHPT) in patients with AD in this study. METHODS: A total of 22 patients with recalcitrant AD were treated with 8 weekly intramuscular injections of either autologous plasma (n = 11) or autologous high-molecular-weight plasma protein fraction (n = 11) for 7 weeks. RESULTS: The clinical severity score of AD (SCORAD value) of 11 patients who completed AHPT significantly decreased from 79.7 ± 17.0 (mean ± SD) at baseline to 65.8 ± 16.4 at 6 weeks and 60.1 ± 16.0 at 7 weeks (Wilcoxon signed-rank test, p < 0.05). There were no significant differences among the SCORAD values measured at baseline (74.2 ± 19.6), at 6 weeks (66.3 ± 23.6) and at 7 weeks (67.5 ± 20.8) in 10 patients who completed APT (p > 0.05). CONCLUSION: This result suggests that the blood component mediating the therapeutic efficacy of ABT in patients with AD might be present in the high-molecular-weight plasma protein fraction.