European journal of clinical investigation
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No systematic study has been published yet on the long-term efficacy of attenuated androgens in hereditary angioedema (HAE). Our aim was to conduct a follow-up study in two (German and Hungarian) cohorts of HAE patients (45 and 39 patients, respectively) undergoing uninterrupted treatment for 6 years with similar (starting dose 128 ± 78 mg per day and 136 ± 70 mg per day, respectively) and constant doses of danazol. ⋯ The differences observed between these cohorts cannot be related to drug dose, the age or gender distribution of subjects or the age at the onset of symptoms or the length of diagnostic delay in the patients. There were, however, marked differences in the baseline pattern of attacks: significantly - 3 times - more abdominal attacks were recorded in German patients. Further studies are necessary to clarify the mechanism of these findings.