The effect of mizolastine on expression of vascular endothelial cell growth factor, tumour necrosis factor‐α and keratinocyte‐derived chemokine in murine mast cells, compared with dexamethasone and loratadine

Summary It has been shown that many antihistamines may have anti-inflammatory activity in addition to being H1 antagonists. Mizolastine (MIZ), a novel antihistamine, might also have anti-angiogenesis properties. In this study, we investigated the influence of MIZ on proangiogenesis factors, vascular endothelial cell growth factor (VEGF), tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-α and keratinocyte-derived chemokine (KC) in murine mast cells by using ELISA and RT–PCR, as compared with dexamethasone (DEX) and loratadine (LOR). Our results show that MIZ is effective in the inhibition of KC, VEGF and TNF-α release induced by an IgE-dependent mechanism, in a time- and dose-dependent manner. The differences between the inhibitory effects of the three drugs on these proangiogenic factors were rather subtle. Semiquantitative analysis using RT–PCR showed that the three drugs significantly reduced VEGF165, VEGF120, TNF-α and KC mRNA expression. Statistical results revealed that the effect of DEX on VEGF165 mRNA was different from that of MIZ or LOR (P   0.05). These findings raise the possibility that MIZ can mediate anti-angiogenesis activity and that the effect may depend not only on the inhibition on the levels of cytokine proteins but also at the mRNA level.