title: Advances in allergen immunotherapy: aiming for complete tolerance to allergens.
abstract: Allergen-specific immunotherapy (AIT) has been used for more than 100 years as a tolerance-inducing therapy for allergic diseases and represents a potentially curative method of treatment. AIT functions through multiple mechanisms, including regulating T and B cell responses, changing antibody isotypes, and decreasing mediator release and migration of eosinophils, basophils, and mast cells to affected tissues. Despite the relative success of AIT, attempts are being made to improve this therapy in order to overcome problems in standardization, efficacy, safety, long duration of treatment, and costs. These have led to the development of biotechnological products with successful clinical results.
authors: Swiss Institute of Allergy and Asthma Research (SIAF), Obere Strasse 22, CH-7270 Davos Platz, Switzerland. Christine Kühne-Center for Allergy Research and Education, Davos, Switzerland. akdisac@siaf.uzh.ch akdism@siaf.uzh.ch.
authors: Cezmi A
authors: CA
authors: Akdis
authors: Swiss Institute of Allergy and Asthma Research (SIAF), Obere Strasse 22, CH-7270 Davos Platz, Switzerland. Christine Kühne-Center for Allergy Research and Education, Davos, Switzerland. akdisac@siaf.uzh.ch akdism@siaf.uzh.ch.
authors: Mübeccel
authors: M
authors: Akdis
mesh_terms: D000485:Allergens / Q000276:immunology*; D000818:Animals; D006801:Humans; D007108:Immune Tolerance; D007167:Immunotherapy
chemical_list: D000485:Allergens