title: Chronic spontaneous urticaria: an autoimmune disease? A revision of the literature.
abstract: The cause of chronic spontaneous urticaria has been an enigma for decades, but the recognition of functional autoantibodies in some patients with the spontaneous chronic urticaria has opened up a new concept of autoimmune urticaria. Clinical and laboratory features are in keeping with an autoimmune aetiology for many patients with otherwise inexplicable disease, but there is still debate about the importance of functional autoantibodies in the disease pathogenesis, how to test them and the clinical implications for treatment and prognosis. This review will look at the evidence for there being an autoimmune subset of urticaria, the strengths and weaknesses of the available tests in current use.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Medicina Interna e Specialistica (DIMIS), Università degli Studi di Palermo, Via del Vespro, 141, 90127, Palermo, Italy. gabriele.dilorenzo@unipa.it
authors.forename: Gabriele
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Di Lorenzo
authors.forename: Maria Stefania
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Leto-Barone
authors.forename: Simona
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: La Piana
authors.forename: Aurelio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Seidita
authors.forename: Giovam Battista
authors.initials: GB
authors.lastname: Rini
mesh_terms: D001323:Autoantibodies / Q000097:blood; D001327:Autoimmune Diseases / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D014581:Urticaria / Q000209:etiology* / Q000473:pathology*
chemical_list: D001323:Autoantibodies