Child allergy diagnosis call
Friday October 14th, 2011
Improved diagnostic techniques are needed to identify allergies in children to help them live normal lives, experts said yesterday.
Professor
Susanne Halken, chairman of the Paediatric Allergy and Asthma Meeting
(PAAM), which is taking place in Barcelona October 13-15, said early diagnosis
can lead to effective treatment and a reduction in symptoms.
“Knowledge about allergies can help patients to avoid contact with offending agents, and thereby to reduce symptoms and avoid risky situations, which may even be life threatening,” she says.
About one in four European children suffer from allergy, but there is evidence to suggest that lifestyle factors and nutritional patterns, such as breastfeeding, can help to reduce the early symptoms of allergy.
“There are some hypotheses suggesting that specific lifestyle and nutritional patterns may lead to early symptoms of allergy. For example, breastfeeding for the first four to six months has been showed to reduce the risk for atopic eczema and cow’s milk protein allergy,” she explains.
“Exposure to many environmental factors have changed during the last decades, including exposure to tobacco smoke, which appears to increase the risk for airway infections and asthma.
“Besides, exposure to allergy developing agents such as food, house dust mites, pets and pollens is a prerequisite for development of allergic diseases, but also many other unknown factors may play a role.
“Genetic factors may also influence the susceptibility to different environmental factors and also influences the pattern of symptoms of the individual child.”
“Some studies report that a child with atopic dermatitis and a family background show higher risk to develop asthma later in life. When one of the parents is allergic, the child is predisposed to be allergic, and the risk is even higher when both parents suffer this disease”.
Physicians agree that one of the key elements in achieving better management of childhood allergy is to improve diagnostic techniques and to develop treatments, she added.
Tags: Allergies & Asthma | Child Health | Europe
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