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Allergies Allergy Basics

Childhood Allergies: What Should Parents Know?

The incidence of allergies in children has increased significantly in the last two decades. On its heels has come a rise in asthma, which is now the number-one diagnosis for child hospital admissions. There are more children with asthma, hay fever, and eczema (allergic rash) than ever before. In my own practice in recent years, I have seen a steady stream of children, as young as six months old with these conditions. Parents tell me their children have runny noses, itchy and watery eyes, coughing and wheezing, without any evidence of viral infection. Many are convinced that their child's exposure to flowers, grass, weeds and pets is the culprit.

General Information on Allergies
Allergy is the term used to describe the immune system's sensitivity to an allergen - any normally benign substance in the environment, such as pollen or mold, that can trigger an allergic reaction in a susceptible person.. The immune system can become sensitized (prone to allergic reaction) after a person inhales an airborne allergen like pollen, or eats certain foods, like milk, peanuts, or eggs. Allergies can develop in the first few months of life, evident as nasal congestion, arching, rash, or diarrhea following the ingestion of certain foods. Refusing food and/or vomiting are good signals of a food allergy in infants. Allergies affect all races and have been found in all parts of the world.

When a person is sensitized to an allergen, any time he or she is exposed to it, the immune system triggers a release of chemicals, such as histamine, that cause the well-known allergy symptoms listed below:

• sneezing
• itchy or stuffy nose
• watery nasal discharge
• itchy eyes
• eye tearing and redness

And less frequently:

• cough
• palatal (roof of the mouth) itch
• bronchial asthma symptoms, such as wheezing
• eczema
• urticaria (hives)
• anaphylaxis

Genetic Factors
If your child develops allergies, the cause will have been a combination of the genes he or she inherited from you, as well as their environmental exposures. As parents, if one of you has a history of allergies, then each of your children will have about a 40 percent chance of developing allergies. If both of you have allergies, then the risk increases to about 80 percent.

Genetic factors have been intensively researched in recent years, and what seems clear is that the genetics of allergy are quite complex, involving interactions between our environment and inherited tendencies. The exact genes that contribute to allergies have not been fully identified.

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