Mesalamine may be preferable to sulfasalazine in dermatologic therapeutics.

摘要

I read with interest Bauza etal.'s article regarding treatment of sulfasalazine for lichen planus.1 In the introduction the authors acknowledge that sulfasalazine is a conjugate of 5-aminosalicylic acid (mesalamine) linked to sulfapyridine, and that the mesalamine component is accepted as being the main active therapeutic moiety. Additionally, most side-effects with sulfasalazine are attributable to the sulfapyridine portion of the molecule. Ironically, the authors treated their patients with sulfasalazine, rather than masalamine.