Results
Nineteen patients (14 males and 5 females) presented with symptoms highly suspicious for SSLR to beta-lactam antibiotics including penicillins and cephalosporins. Clinical symptoms included joint inflammation (arthritis) that included hands, feet, or both and cutaneous lesions (maculopapular, EM, urticaria). The mean age of the patients was 9.9 years and ranged from 11 months to 67 years. The characteristics of the patient population is summarized in Table 1. When blood samples were obtained from the 19 patients and 19 other age and gender-matched healthy volunteer cohort, all patients had positive LTA test results using a cut-off value of 20% increase in cell death (Figure 1). At 125 µM of the drug and in the presence of phenobarbitone-induced rat liver microsomes (MICs), degree of cell death was significantly higher (p<0.05) in cells isolated from beta-lactam-induced SSLR patients (48%±5.6) than cells from healthy controls (8%±4.6).