Dupilumab for Allergic Contact Dermatitis: An Overview of Its Use and Impact on Patch Testing.

Allergic contact dermatitis (ACD) has been estimated to affect up to 20% of the general population. Patch testing is the gold standard for identification of causative allergens. When allergen avoidance fails, current treatment options include topical and oral corticosteroids, systemic immunosuppressants, and phototherapy. Dupilumab, a monoclonal antibody targeting IL-4/IL-13, is approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of moderate to severe atopic dermatitis. It also has been used off label with some success in the treatment of ACD. This article discusses the evidence for using dupilumab to treat ACD as well as considerations for patch testing in patients who are taking this medication.

Characterization and assessment of nanoencapsulated sanguinarine chloride as a potential treatment for melanoma.

Sanguinarine has a history of use in both folk medicine and early dermatology for the treatment of cutaneous neoplasms. Applied indiscriminately, bloodroot is an escharotic agent with potential to cause extensive tissue necrosis. However, when used in a controlled fashion, sanguinarine imparts selective cytotoxic/anti-proliferative activity through multiple mechanisms against human/ murine melanoma. To exploit sanguinarine's observed activity against melanoma, a targeted delivery system is required. We present a sol-gel based nanoparticulate platform for encapsulating sanguinarine chloride(sang-np)-a targeted therapeutic capable of steady, reliable delivery of predictable quantities of drug over a sustained time period with minimal undesirable effects. Size and release kinetics of sang-np were characterized using dynamic light scattering and ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy respectively. In vitro efficacy of sang-np was assessed. At both 2 and 24 hours, free sanguinarine killed > 90% of B16 melanoma cells, assessed via MTT assay. At 2 hours, sang-np killed a portion of melanoma cells, increasing to percentages comparable to free sanguinarine by 24 hours. Control(empty) nanoparticles exerted minimal toxicity to melanoma cells at both time points. TUNEL assay revealed that treatment with both sanguinarine and sang-np induces apoptosis in B16 melanoma cells, suggesting that both treatments act via the same mechanism of action. These data confirm controlled release of sanguinarine from sang-np, as well as comparable efficacy and mechanism of action to sanguinarine alone. This suggests that nanoparticle delivery of sanguinarine may be a unique approach to capitalize on this potent agent's inherent anti-tumor activity and overcome many of the limitations with its current formulation.