Dogs: eczema patients' best friend in more than one way

And now for something completely different...

Dog eczema!

Quite frequently I see items in my news feed about canine eczema. I haven't paid them any attention. But today I saw something worth commenting on. Imulan, a company based in Arizona, announced that it had developed a biomarker for canine eczema.

Who cares? was my first thought. But I was intrigued, because in reading the NIAMS roundtable summary the other day, I'd seen that dogs are considered a potential experimental model for human eczema. So any research done using dogs as models might not only benefit dogs, but also humans.

I wondered why it was worth anyone's time to develop a biomarker for eczema in dogs. (A biomarker is any protein or metabolite in your body whose level is correlated with your risk of developing a disease-- or the chance that you have it already. Biomarkers are emerging as a biomedical field--for example, Tethys Bioscience in Emeryville, CA is developing biomarkers for diabetes.) If you have eczema, it shows. Why do you need a biomarker?

Then I understood. Dogs scratch all the time. They get fleas, etc. They roll in their own feces and other stuff. So it's harder for a veterinarian to diagnose eczema for a dog than for a human doctor to diagnose it for a patient. A biomarker would enable the vet to make a quick, definitive diagnosis.

Imulan says that its canine eczema biomarker is based on its "T cell receptor therapeutic peptide vaccine." This opened my eyes. They're claiming to have a vaccine for eczema! Bold. I have no idea what data this is based on. Nor do I know exactly what a "TCR peptide vaccine" is.

I did a Google search and it seems that there have been a number of papers published on TCR peptide vaccines, although the ones I checked out concerned vaccines against lymphocytic cancer in mice. And those were EXTREMELY preliminary.

The idea, Imulan says, is that a messed-up T cell balance (type 1 helper vs. type 2) is at the root of eczema (this, of course, is not established in humans; the imbalance is likely a symptom, not the original cause) and so you need to cancel out, or mute, the type 2 T cells. In short, as I understand it, you vaccinate so that your body produces a lot of antibodies against YOUR OWN T cells, thus shutting them down.

This seems nutty to me, and if tried in humans, likely to lead to something like the "cytokine storm" that nearly killed the six volunteers in a 2006 trial of an experimental T cell-stimulating antibody. But Imulan claims their vaccines have shown promise in dogs.

I'll have to ferret out their data (pun intended).

The sweet smell of dog

About that University of Cincinnati study. General feeling being that having a dog as a pet can only be a good thing for your baby because intense exposure to dog aeroallergen somehow has a long-term anti-inflammatory effect in those allergic to dogs, compared to cat aeroallergen, which is pure refined evil has a significant correlation with eczema at the age of 4 in kids with cat allergies.

Eczema seems to be a disease with a major autoimmune component.This kind of cohort survey research is constructive to the effort to find cures for eczema because it can highlight particular allergens and scientists can then look closely at what those allergens are doing to your immune system.

The authors mention collecting vacuum samples from the floors of people taking part in the study. They measured the concentrations of the major dog and cat allergens in dust. I was interested to find that they already know what these allergens are. These must be the active agents in skin prick tests.

It's a scientific paper so there's no mention made of this, but there should be: having a dog is a major undertaking. I know. About six years ago, Hidden B and I adopted an Australian cattle dog puppy. I loved the dog (didn't grow up with one; dad foisted a cat on us for a few years). I enjoyed going for a jog with her; going for a hike and throwing a tennis ball; trying and generally failing to teach her manners. But the work, the work. Picking up the poop in the backyard, which became a manicured latrine. Dealing with noise complaints from neighbors. Stopping the mutt from savaging the postman. And paying the kennel bill whenever we went on vacation. It was like having a kid. (In retrospect, good practice.) So you just can't expect a family with a history of atopy to casually take on caring for a dog.

But maybe someone can develop a reverse air purifier, which comes with a filter loaded with dog hair and dander, and blows a sweet, gentle doggy breeze into your house while you and your loved ones sleep.