Botanical seed oils reduce the generation of leukotrienes in patients with asthma.
Our objective was to determine the efficacy of a botanical seed oil combination against airflow obstruction in asthma, and to determine the pharmacogenomic effect of the leukotriene C
4
synthase (LTC
4
S) polymorphism A-444C.
We conducted a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, cross-over clinical trial in mild to moderate asthmatics to determine the change in FEV
1
after 6 weeks of therapy with borage and echium seed oils versus corn oil placebo. We also examined the effect of the variant LTC
4
S -444C allele on the change in lung function.
We did not identify a difference in FEV
1
in the study cohort as a whole (n = 28), nor in the group of A homozygotes. In the C allele carriers (n = 9), FEV
1
improved by 3% after treatment with borage and echium seed oils and declined by 4% after placebo corn oil (p = 0.02). All 9 C allele carriers demonstrated an improvement in their FEV
1
on active treatment compared to placebo as compared to only 7 out of 19 A allele homozygotes (p = 0.007). We observed transient differences in
ex vivo
leukotriene generation from circulating basophils and granulocytes. We did not observe significant differences in urinary LTE
4
levels.
We conclude that compared to corn oil, a combination of borage and echium seed oils improves airflow obstruction in mild to moderate asthmatics who carry the variant allele in the LTC
4
S gene (A-444C). Botanical oil supplementation may have therapeutic potential in asthma if used in a personalized manner.
Trial registration:
This trial was registered at
http://www.clinicaltrials.gov
as NCT00806442....

LTC4 synthase polymorphism modifies efficacy of botanical seed oil combination in asthma

10.1186/2193-1801-3-661