Methods
Prospective study evaluating children aged under 16 years reporting DHRs to beta-lactams. Reactions were classified as immediate and nonimmediate reactions. The work-up included sIgE, skin testing and drug provocation tests (DPTs) for immediate reactions and patch testing and DPTs for nonimmediate ones.
ResultsOf the 510 included children, 133 were evaluated for immediate reactions and confirmed in 8.3%. Skin test/in vitro IgE contributed to diagnosing half of the cases. Selective reactions occurred with amoxicillin (63%), followed by common penicillin determinants (27%) and cephalosporins (0.9%).
Among nonimmediate reactions (11,4% of the 377 children evaluated), most required DPTs, 52.7% of which were positive at 6–7 days of drug challenge. Selective reactions were identified with amoxicillin (80%), penicillin G (7.5%), cephalosporins (7.5%), and clavulanic acid (5%). Urticaria and maculopapular exanthema were the most frequent entities.