Specific safety problems of inappropriate immune responses to immunostimulating agents

The sensible use of immunostimulating agents is a major challenge to the immunologist, the pharmacologist and the clinician. These agents comprise a large and heterogeneous group of recently developed substances aimed at the pharmacological manipulation of the immune system. Their use is not simple and is associated with some specific safety problems. Thus, in addition to the usual array of general toxic, idiosyncratic and allergic adverse reactions found with many drugs, immunostimulating agents may cause some specific undesirable, immunotoxic effects, resulting in enhancement rather than suppression of the treated disease process. Jacob Shoham explains the general and specific safety problems of these agents in this review and outlines an approach to their evaluation.