They found the itch cells!

Researchers identify cells that say 'scratch me'
AP

By LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical Writer Lauran Neergaard, Ap Medical Writer – 1 hr 30 mins ago

WASHINGTON – Got an itch to scratch? Scientists have pinpointed a key group of cells that sends itch-alerts to the brain. When researchers at Washington University in St. Louis knocked out those cells in mice, it alleviated their itchiness without affecting their ability to sense pain — work that opens a possible new target for creating better itch relievers.

Don't underestimate that need. The kind of itch caused by bug bites or allergies typically goes away with a little scratching or some antihistamines. But some people can scratch themselves raw without relieving serious, daily itching triggered by a variety of conditions, such as certain cancers, chronic kidney failure, and even use of certain narcotic pain relievers.

Indeed, pain and itch have been difficult to separate. Previous research has found various nerve pathways that seem involved in both.

But Thursday's report in the journal Science is the first to identify itch-specific cells in the spinal cord, that highway that delivers sensation to the brain.

"It's exciting," said well-known itch specialist Dr. Gil Yosipovitch of North Carolina's Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center, who wasn't involved in the new research. "This comprehensive study opens the field."

Lead researcher Zhou-Feng Chen, a Washington University associate professor of anesthesiology, in 2007 discovered the first gene related to itchiness, named GRPR. They found that mice with an inactive version of the gene scratched less when exposed to itchy things than mice with an active gene.

But that didn't prove that the spinal cord neurons, or nerve cells, that harbored this gene were itch-specific. They could also be important to genes related to pain sensation.

So this time, Chen's team injected the spinal cords of mice with a neurotoxin that seeks out the GRPR receptor, sort of a docking site. Over about two weeks, the toxin killed about 80 percent of the cells that harbored that gene.

Before those injections, the mice scratched vigorously. But after the itch cells were killed off, their scratching plummeted — in some cases stopped completely — when Chen introduced one after another itchy substance.

They weren't simply numbed: Their motor function remained normal, and so did their response to pain from heat and pressure in a series of common experiments that show animals flick their tails or pull away their paws during various stresses.

This isn't the only itch pathway to the brain, stressed Wake Forest's Yosipovitch. Nor does anyone know if this gene would behave similarly in people. But researchers have been hunting itch-specific receptors in hopes of eventually learning how to block their "scratch-me" signals to the brain and help relieve at least some types of itch.

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On the Net:

Science: http://www.sciencemag.org

Infant Dies from Eczema

This story just broke my heart. A child in Australia dies from severe eczema and now the parents are on trial because they chose homeopathic ways to treat it and as a result, the baby died. I've always known the effects of eczema could dramatically reduce one's quality of life, but this it he first time I'm actually hearing of death (though there are probably more cases like this but I just never knew).

http://www.smh.com.au/national/couple-did-not-know-eczema-was-fatal-20090506-avef.html

More news on bleach baths for eczema

More news from the UK on bleach baths. This is definitely showing improvement for children. Again, I'd love to try this but the thought of putting bleach on my face worries me a little.

'Bleach Bath' benefits children with eczema

Guava

I got to see my husband's cousin over the weekend and I finally got to ask him what he used on his face to get rid of his eczema. He had one of the more severe cases of eczema I have seen. But over the past year, his face has been perfectly clear.

He told me he uses boiled guava leaves. His parents bring guava leaves (young guava) back from the Philippines. He boils them and uses a cotton ball or swab or something to apply it to his face. Then he refrigerates the leaves and uses it again later.

Here too is a quick little article on what to do:
http://www.ehow.com/how_2224676_treat-inflamed-eczema.html

Eczema on the rise - 40% increase in 5 years!

This article totally threw me for a loop. According to the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, incidences of eczema has risen a whopping 40% in five years (I am assuming this is for the UK only). Wow. Can that be true? If so, then why isn't there more being done about it? Does this mean that there are just more and more people with this genetic mutation? I wonder what the numbers are for the US and for the rest of the world. I do remember reading somewhere that incidences were higher in industrialized countries (perhaps eczema is linked to the rise in all the crap we've been eating over the years, like trans fats, etc.)

Read article

The Link Between Diabetes and Eczema

Scientists have reported in Nature (March 26, 2009 issue) that a protein called caspase 8 plays a critical role in the healing of wounds in laboratory mice. Caspase 8 is deficient in humans with eczema, but produced in excess amounts by diabetics.

The researchers say their discovery may explain why many diabetics lack a normal wound response and suffer severe complications from minor cuts and scrapes, and why those with eczema exhibit a chronic inflammation of the skin that compromises its protective function.

Read article

Target Market

I was just thinking this morning, as I slathered on more CeraVe cream, that eczema sufferers are such easy targets for marketers. Whether you sell the latest cream, lotion, potion or snake oil -- an eczema sufferer will most likely try it, because they(correction: WE) will try anything for relief. There must be a study out there that measures this market - the how many millions or billions of dollars spent worldwide OTC eczema products. What's your guess?

MHRA Warning Against Unlicensed Eczema Creams

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) issued a warning against unlicensed eczema creams which actually contain strong steroids. Apparently, a parent thought he/she was buying a "natural" cream from India but became concerned when it cleared up his kid's skin in three days.

Here's the part that kills me:

The unlicensed product was supplied in an unlabelled plastic tub and was found to contain the corticosteroid betamethasone dipropionate.

Unlabelled plastic tub? This parent bought something in an unlabelled plastic tub and stuck it on his child's skin? Yikes! Please people. I know we're all desperate to find a cure for this, but hopefully we can all verify the ingredients of the lotions that come in contact with our precious skin.

On the To Do list: Chinese Medicine

I haven't gone the route of Chinese Medicine yet to treat my eczema, but the latest study from the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI)looks promising. Scores for severity and impairment of life quality went down for the 14 patients studied who received traditional Chinese medicine.

Patients also reported a reduction in the use of steroids, antibiotics and antihistamines within 3 months of being treated. Always a plus!

Yet Another Moisturizer - This Time With Ceramides

I am finally getting a better understanding of how skin works, or rather, doesn't work, when it comes to eczema. In a nutshell, the outer layer of the epidermis called the stratum corneum, is your main skin barrier and it is made up of three types of lipids -- cholesterol, free fatty acids and ceramides. Since about half of the lipids in this outermost layer is made up of ceramides - these are pretty important to the functioning of healthy skin.

Apparently, people with eczema don't have as many of these ceramides as people without eczema. This means that the outermost layer of your skin, or your main skin barrier, breaks down and ends up unable to lock water in and unable to keep the bad stuff like allergens, pollutants, chemicals, bacteria, viruses, etc - out. Enter Dry Skin and Skin Infections = Eczema.

So that means, we need to replace those ceramides. Moisturizing is key but if you're like me, all the different moisturizers I've purchased over the years hasn't done much. I now realize that maybe I haven't been using the right moisturizer. What is needed is a moisturizer that contains ceramides, so that it actually repairs the skin barrier. All this time I've been trying my luck with any old moisturizer, but in actuality what I needed was a barrier-repair moisturizer.

I haven't seen the studies yet that actually prove whether ceramide-enriched moisturizers actually do repair the skin. But it's worthy a try and it makes sense to me. I looked at this list of ceramide moisturizers and went out to buy a jar of CeraVe because it was the cheapest and most readily available. The stuff stings when I put it on my face, but goes away after a little bit and man, my face is soft. I'll have to see how I progress over the next few days. Just have to think positive and visualize all those little lipids repairing the skin barrier so that my skin stays soft and doesn't get infected anymore.

Sinusitis and Eczema

Interesting study linking chronic sinusitis with atopic dermatitis in children.

A new study suggests that upper airway infections (UAI) may exacerbate atopic dermatitis (AD) in children, and surgical treatment for those infections may improve the severity of the skin disease, according to the results of a St. Louis University School of Medicine study authored by Aayesha M. Khan, M.D.; Thomas J. Donovan, M.D.; and Barbara Mossman, R.N., of the department of otolaryngology, and Elaine C. Siegfried, M.D., of the department of dermatology.

The study also suggests the possibility that chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) activates the immune system, and that treatment of CRS leads to concurrent improvement in AD.

My story

I've been dealing with the worst outbreak of eczema I have had in 15 years. The last time it was this bad, I was an exchange student living in Switzerland. At that time, I had to deal with dermatologists in a foreign language, which was stressful in and of itself. We tried everything, including a misting machine (similar to putting our face above a cool mist humidifier) and light therapy (I got a great tan out of it). Eventually it went away, and for years afterward, I was able to manage the comparatively minor outbreaks of eczema. My problem spot is on my face, above and below my lips.

I remember doing my first round of allergy tests while in Switzerland and the number one thing that came up for me was an allery to benzylchomium chloride, a preservative used in eye drops and many other things.

A second, though less severe outbreak happened about 6 years ago and so I started another round of allergy tests. This time, the #1 culprit was tree pollens. All kinds of trees, particularly California trees like cypress and juniper. I decided against the shots since my outbreak wasn't so bad.

This time, my outbreak is even more puzzling. Somehow, I developed acne on TOP of the eczema. I went to a dermatologist who had no idea what that was, but told me she could give me steroids for the eczema, but that would exacerbate the acne. Or she could give me acne medicine, but that would exacerbate the eczema. Great! Although I have the prescriptions for these medecines in my purse, I decided to hold off on it and try olive oil instead. So far so good. What I've learned is when the eczema is hardened, I don't feel any itch at all. All the hardened skin is actually protecting what is underneath from any allergens, so even though it looks HORRIBLE, I feel ok. I was putting tons and tons of Eucerin cream, but i actually think that might have been what caused the acne. Plus, I starated to feel the itch when I put the cream on. Olive oil hasn't done that - no itch. I used it on my hands and non-eczema parts of my face too and they are now so soft.

Celebrity Watch: LeAnn Rimes

LeAnn Rimes talks about her battle with eczema here.

I have a mutant gene

In 2006, Scottish researchers released the results of a study in Nature Genetics that found that two-thirds of eczema sufferers and a quarter of asthma cases involve mutations to a gene that helps form the skin's outer protective layer. They found that two different mutations to a gene called fillagrin were much more common in the eczema groups they studied than in the general population

Fillagrin helps to form the skin's outer protective layer, which is made up of dead cells that are collapsed together into a continuous protein sheath that keeps water in and invaders such as bacteria out. Mutations to the fillagrin gene keep it from producing fillagrin protein needed to protect the skin.

This gives me hope! This means that someday, all the super smart people in the world who are working on this might find a way to give us the fillagrin proteins that our mutant genes lack.

Bacteria and Bleach

There are some great articles in the NY Times on eczema. Here is a link from one article along with some of the things I noted that I'd like to investigate further.

From article in NY Times, July 2008:
Author: Ingfei Chen

• Chronic eczema is a complex disorder that involves an overwrought immune system and, often, a defective gene that leaves the skin barrier leaky, dry and easily irritated.
• For one patient, Staphylococcus aureus, a lab test revealed — had accelerated a full-body eczema outbreak, could bacteria still be fueling her rashes?
• Dermatologist prescribes high-potency topical corticosteroid, antibiotic pills, and a bacteria-killing ointment called mupirocin and a Clorox bath.
• 90% if eczema sufferes carry Staph aureus on their skin
• Gentle bleach bath (half cup bleach in full bath tub) can kill skin microbes - tests shows promise according to Dr. Amy Paller of Northwestern University
• Take more baths, not less - to clean off bacteria and hydrate the skin

So Clorox, huh? Seems a little scary to stick bleach on your skin but I might try it on the patch on my hand just to see. The worst part for me is on my face, so not sure I want to go there yet.

Let's Begin

This is my personal collection of articles, links and stories of hope on eczema. There is so much scattered information out there, that I wanted a place to bring it all together so that I could make sense of it all. Hopefully, you can too.