Overview on Current Status and Combination of Test Methods

Abstract

During the last years significant progress has been made in the development and validation of animal-free methods for assessing skin sensitization. Despite these advances, more efforts are still needed to refine the existing methods and to further develop new methods that lead to an improved awareness of the real mechanisms of a chemical in triggering a sensitization reaction in exposed human beings. An important observation is that detailed analysis of chemicals producing misleading results may help to define limitations of the respective tests methods and the databases derived from animal studies. Already several testing strategies have emerged that combine the data different test methods. At the moment, the usefulness of these strategies in the context of integrated approaches to testing and assessment (IATA) for skin sensitization is being evaluated. A key remaining challenge is the evaluation of chemical sensitizer potency using in vitro methods; however, based on the ongoing developments, it is expected that this may become reality in the near future.