Aspirin allergic response

Special interest in the prostaglandins has focused on pain of inflammation and allergic responses. The medical significance is easy to see. Five million Americans have rheumatoid arthritis, an inflammatory disease. Bronchial asthma and other allergic diseases are equally important. Our most common medicine is aspirin, an anti-inflammatory drug. Both the inflammatory response and the immune response are normal parts of the defense mechanisms of the body, but both are potentially harmful, and it is their regulation that is probably faulty in rheumatoid arthritis and asthma. Overproduction of prostaglandins may be a cause of menstrual cramps.308... 

Smith AP. Response of aspirin-allergic patients to challenge by some analgesics in common use. BMJ 1971 2(760) 494-6. 

Though side effects and allergic responses are rare, the label warns that aspirin may cause nausea and vomiting and should be avoided late in pregnancy. Because aspirin can interfere with blood clotting, it should not be used by hemophiliacs or following surgery of the mouth. 

Cooke RA (1919) Allergy in drug idiosyncrasy. JAMA 73 759-760 Criep LH (1971) Allergic vascular purpura. J Allergy Clin Immunol 48 7-12 Delaney JC (1976) Response on patients with asthma and aspirin idiosyncrasy to tartrazine (a dye commonly used in food and drug industries). Practitioner 217 285-287 Derbes VJ (1964) The fixed eruption. JAMA 190 765-766... 

Although immunologic reactions to acetyl salicylic acid (Aspirin, ASA) may occur, anaphylactic-type reactions to ASA are more commonly non-allergic. Often not apparent until adult life, ASA intolerance is probably a genetically determined idiosyncratic response (Schlumberger, 1980). 

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