Contrast medium drug interactions

In the absence of easy-to-perform and reliable assays for the detection of contrast media-reactive IgE antibodies in patients sera, some other less direct but arguably more biologically and clinically relevant test procedures have occasionally been employed. With both the basophil activation and Prausnitz-Kustner (P-K) tests, the interaction between allergen (contrast medium) and IgE antibodies takes place at the basophil (or mast cell) surface, thus mimicking the in vivo situation. However, for different reasons, neither test has become, nor is likely to soon become, a routinely and widely applied procedure for the diagnosis of adverse reactions to contrast media or any other drug (see below). 

In contrast to bioinert materials, which are designed to prevent any interaction with the surrounding medium, bioactive materials come in contact with the environment as they trigger a specific material-tissue interaction such as EC proliferation or release drugs such as anticoagulation or anti-inflammatory agents [1,11,75]. 

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