OBJECTIVE To compare the three year safety and efficacy of cyclosporin and parenteral gold in the treatment of early, active, severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and to study the reversibility of cyclosporin associated renal dysfunction in patients who discontinued cyclosporin treatment. METHODS The patients continued to receive cyclosporin or parenteral gold in an 18 month open extension to an...

Objective: To compare the three year safety and efficacy of cyclosporin and parenteral gold in the treatment of early, active, severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and to study the reversibility of cyclosporin associated renal dysfunction in patients who discontinued cyclosporin treatment. Methods: The patients continued to receive cyclosporin or parenteral gold in an 18 month open extension to an...

Cyclosporin A has proved to be a valuable drug both in the prevention of graft rejection after solid organ transplantation' and in the prevention of graft versus host disease after bone marrow transplantation.2 Caine et al treated the first cadaver renal allograft recipients with cyclosporin A in 1978,3 and toxicity due to the drug was noted soon afterwards. The adverse effects in transplant re...

Three patients with polymyositis refractory to conventional steroid and immunosuppressive treatment, but responsive to cyclosporin A, are described. In a fourth patient cyclosporin A was used as a first line drug in combination with steroids in the treatment of life-threatening dermatomyositis. Cyclosporin A in the management of polymyositis/dermatomyositis requires formal assessment of its cos...

To ascertain the efficacy of systemic cyclosporin therapy in the management of scleritis we performed an open, uncontrolled study of the use of this drug in severe refractory disease. Five of seven patients whose disease had previously been poorly controlled with a combination of corticosteroids and immunosuppressive drugs responded to cyclosporin therapy (10 mg/kg/day). Systemic side effects o...

Cyclosporin A induces closure of the mitochondrial permeability transition pore. We aimed to investigate whether this closure results in concomitant increases in mitochondrial membrane potential (DeltaPsim) and the production of reactive oxygen species. Fluorescent probes were used to assess DeltaPsim (JC-1, 5,5',6,6'-tetrachloro-1,1',3,3'-tetraethyl-benzimidazolyl-carbocyanine iodide), reactiv...

Cyclosporin was used successfully in a patient with severe pulmonary sarcoidosis, a poor response and unacceptable side-effects from corticosteroid therapy. Computed tomography (CT) scanning initially suggested reversible disease, and subsequently detected improvement earlier than other indices of disease activity. This information was critical in the decision to commence and to continue cyclos...

Recent experiments in mice have demonstrated that the systemic exposure to p.o. administered paclitaxel is significantly enhanced with coadministration of the P-glycoprotein blocker SDZ PSC 833 (J. van Asperen et al, Br. J. Cancer, 76: 1181-1183, 1997). To facilitate further research on the feasibility of a clinically effective oral formulation of paclitaxel, it is important to know whether cot...

The clinical effects of cyclosporin were evaluated during cytotoxic treatment in a 61 year old man with acute myeloid leukaemia. He had required a renal transplant 18 months before presenting with acute myeloid leukaemia (FAB subtype M4). He had received cyclosporin 3.5-4.0 mg/kg daily to maintain a plasma cyclosporin concentration of 75-150 ng/ml. Cyclosporin was continued during induction che...