60 patients diagnosed as having urticaria were included in the study ; 30 patients were effected with acute urticaria and 30 patients were affected with chronic urticaria. In addition, 30 healthy adult volunteers were selected as control group .The patients and control groups sera were examined with enzyme linked immunosorbent assay ( ELISA) to detect total level IgE and radial immunodiffusion (RID) to detect levels of IgG , IgA and IgM . The total level of IgE in acute urticaria ( 1.45±0.13) IU/mL and chronic urticaria (2.12 ± 0.10) IU/mL patients were significantly higher than the control groups ( 0.85 ± 0.10)IU/mL (p<0.05). The level of IgG in acute urticaria ( 12.5± 0.42) g/L and chronic (13.16±0.40) g/L patients , IgA in acute (2.5±0.2)g/L and chronic (2.39±0.19)g/L patients , and IgM in acute (1.75±0.11)g/L and chronic (1.47 ±0.07)g/L , patients were also significantly higher the control groups ( 9.79± 0.81) g/L,(1.63±0.14)g/L and (1.19±0.07) g/L respectively .The level of IgE was higher in the chronic urticaria patients than the acute urticaria stressing the importance of type-I hypersensitivity reaction in chronic urticaria .While the level of IgM was significantly higher in the acute urticaria patients than the chronic urticaria which may suggest that some cases of acute urticaria were caused by acute infections .
