Novel Cellular and Molecular Mechanisms in Allergic Inflammation

R. Schleimer

>I wanted to respond to some of your questions with (as usual) other questions:
>Don't you think that all this "fear" of steroids is misplaced, given how ICS have revolutionised the course of asthma and other airway inflammatory diseases? Isn't a touch of growth retardation--if it's even true--a price worth paying for prevention of emergency room admissions, hospitalisations and death due to asthma? At the biological level, wouldn't we expect a plateau effect on bone (and other side effects), just as we appear to have with beneficial effects?
>Is there evidence of differential effects of ICS on cytokines from a given cell source (e.g., T-cells or epithelium)--or are they all equally affected at the tissue level?

>Looking forward to a finishing flurry on these and other steroidal issues,

>Judah