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Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is a rare disease but with significant morbidity and high mortality. There is no specific way to diagnose PAH. Thus, an easy used with good sensitivity and specificity biomarker of PAH is highly desirable to aid in the screening, diagnosis, and follow-up. Caveolin-1 (Cav1) is the structural protein of caveolae and is highly expressed in type I pneumocytes. Lungs tissues from idiopathic PAH (IPAH) patients showed decreased expression of Cav1 in vascular endothelial cells. Therefore, we developed a direct sandwich immunoassay for the determination of Cav1 in IAPH patient's serum. The result disclosed serum Cav1 level was significantly lower in IPAH than control groups. Using serum Cav1, 17.17 pg/mL as a cutoff value, the sensitivity was 0.59 and the specificity was 1.0. There were two major findings in our results. First, serum Cav1 might be a novel biomarker in the diagnosis of IPAH with fare sensitivity and good specificity. Second, Cav1 might be used to make differential diagnosis between COPD-PH and IPAH group.

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Background: Proteins from latex gloves have been documented to trigger occupational latex allergy among health care workers. Allergen characterization of latex glove extract has never been studied in Taiwan. This study aimed to identify allergenic proteins from latex gloves. Methods: Crude extracts of latex gloves were prepared with phosphate-buffered saline and 20 medical workers with a history of latex allergy were enrolled in this study. The specific IgE antibody was determined by the Pharmacia CAP system and in-house enzyme-linked immunoassay and immunoblotting. The target proteins were excised from two-dimensional PAGE and analyzed by electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry. Results: Immunoblotting of glove extracts revealed three IgE-binding proteins at a molecular mass of 45, 30 and 14 kDa. Peptide mass fingerprinting revealed that the protein at 45 kDa, which was recognized by 10% (2/20) of atopic sera tested, was an allergenic lipolytic esterase from Hevea brasiliensis (Hev b 13). The 30- and 14-kDa proteins, which were recognized by 55% (11/20) and 85% (17/20) of patients’ sera, were found to be hevamine and rubber elongation factor (Hev b 1), respectively. Conclusions: Our results indicated that hevamine and Hev b 1 are the major allergens from latex gloves in Taiwan, which differs from the reports in Western countries.