title: Understanding allergic asthma from allergen inhalation tests.
abstract: The allergen challenge has evolved, in less than 150 years, from a crude tool used to document the etiology of allergen-induced disease to a well-controlled tool used today to investigate the pathophysiology and pharmacotherapy of asthma. Highlights of the authors' involvement with the allergen challenge include confirmation of the immunoglobulin E-dependence of the late asthmatic response, importance of (nonallergic) airway hyper-responsiveness as a determinant of the airway response to allergen, identification of allergen-induced increase in airway hyper-responsiveness, documentation of beta(2)-agonist-induced increase in airway response to allergen (including eosinophilic inflammation), advances in understanding the pathophysiology and kinetics of allergen-induced airway responses, and development of a multicentre clinical trial group devoted to using the allergen challenge for investigating promising new therapeutic strategies for asthma.
authors.affiliation: University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada. don.cockcroft@usask.ca
authors.forename: Donald W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Cockcroft
authors.forename: Fredrick E
authors.initials: FE
authors.lastname: Hargreave
authors.forename: Paul M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: O'Byrne
authors.forename: Louis-Philippe
authors.initials: LP
authors.lastname: Boulet
mesh_terms: D000485:Allergens / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000276:immunology; D001249:Asthma / Q000266:history / Q000276:immunology*; D001985:Bronchial Provocation Tests / Q000266:history / Q000379:methods*; D002170:Canada; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049674:History, 21st Century; D006801:Humans; D006967:Hypersensitivity / Q000276:immunology / Q000503:physiopathology; D007073:Immunoglobulin E / Q000276:immunology
chemical_list: D000485:Allergens; D007073:Immunoglobulin E