Specificities of B cell reactions to drugs. The penicillin model.

Betalactams conjugate to protein carriers induced T and B cell effector responses. From these, IgE dependent reactions are the most common and better defined. These antibodies recognize a number of structures that can cross react or selective recognition may occur. The great variability in the chemical structure, specifically at the position R of penicillin and R1 of cephallosporins has made that the recognition of these structures may have clinical relevance in the evaluation of patients allergic to betalactams.