The Development of Foreign Protein Sensitization in Human Beings

[摘要] The gradual development and maintenance of skin sensitivity to serum protein in human beings has been followed over a period of nearly two years. The first evidence of this hyper-reactivity is a twenty-four-hour delayed type of skin reaction. This type of skin sensitivity is in most instances replaced in more sensitive subjects by the usual immediate wheal and flare at the site of injection. There are great individual variations in the ease with which individuals develop, maintain, and lose their sensitivity, but most persons having repeated intracutaneous injections of this protein eventually become more or less sensitive.The skin sensitivity is lost in the reverse order of its appearance—the immediate wheal is replaced by the twenty-four-hour reaction and this in turn will become negative.Serum antibody studies in so far as done further emphasized the quantitative variations of sensitivity in the various individuals.Human beings may be rendered quite sensitive to very minute amounts of serum protein by the intracutaneous route of injection.The significance of this twenty-four-hour delayed “allergic” type of reaction is briefly discussed.

[学科分类] 生物科学（综合）