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Advances in food allergy

Food allergy can be lifestyle changing and as a leading cause of anaphylaxis it can also be life-threatening. The incidence of food allergy in children aged 0-5 is thought to have doubled in the last 10 years, and continues to affect millions of adults.

Awareness and diagnosis of food allergy as well as effective management and treatment for sufferers is imperative in order to prevent life-threatening events. Key areas of focus to aid further understanding of food hypersensitivity as well as to help provide improved support for patients include: epidemiology of food allergy; diagnosis, from clinical to molecular; mechanisms involved in sensitisation; allergy manifestations and tolerance; predictive factors; active treatment options both allergen-specific and non allergen-specific.

This cross-journal collection brings together the findings published in BioMed Central's allergy journals. We hope that this coordinated focus on food allergy will help to raise awareness and stimulate interest within the community.

 Image: courtesy of dcastor, creative commons

  1. Avoidance of food allergens requires adapting dietetic habits, changing nutritional approach. A restriction of food choice can result in a monotonous diet and impact social life. This study investigated the im...

    Authors: Laura Polloni, Alice Toniolo, Francesca Lazzarotto, Ileana Baldi, Francesca Foltran, Dario Gregori and Antonella Muraro
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:41
  2. While food allergies and eczema are among the most common chronic non-communicable diseases in children in many countries worldwide, quality data on the burden of these diseases is lacking, particularly in dev...

    Authors: Susan L Prescott, Ruby Pawankar, Katrina J Allen, Dianne E Campbell, John KH Sinn, Alessandro Fiocchi, Motohiro Ebisawa, Hugh A Sampson, Kirsten Beyer and Bee-Wah Lee
    Citation: World Allergy Organization Journal 2013 6:18
  3. One of the IL-17 family members, IL-25, has been implicated with the initiation and amplification of Th2 responses in animal models and has been associated with airway hyper-reactivity. The involvement of IL-2...

    Authors: Joost A Aalberse, Anders O van Thuijl, Yolanda Meijer, Wilco de Jager, Tjitske van der Palen-Merkus, Aline B Sprikkelman, Maarten O Hoekstra, Berent J Prakken and Femke van Wijk
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:40
  4. The incidence of food allergy is such that most schools will be attended by at least one food allergic child, obliging school personnel to cope with cases at risk of severe allergic reactions. Schools need to ...

    Authors: Laura Polloni, Francesca Lazzarotto, Alice Toniolo, Giorgia Ducolin and Antonella Muraro
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:39
  5. Food-induced anaphylaxis (FIA) in adults is often insufficiently diagnosed. One reason is related to the presence of co-factors like exercise, alcohol, additives and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. The ...

    Authors: Stephanie Hompes, Sabine Dölle, Josefine Grünhagen, Linus Grabenhenrich and Margitta Worm
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:38
  6. It is not exactly known why certain food proteins are more likely to sensitize. One of the characteristics of most food allergens is that they are stable to the acidic and proteolytic conditions in the digesti...

    Authors: Jolanda HM Van Bilsen, Léon MJ Knippels, André H Penninks, Willem F Nieuwenhuizen, Harmen HJ De Jongh and Stef J Koppelman
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:36
  7. Buying behaviours of food-allergic consumers can affect the risk they incur. An online survey was undertaken to understand the characteristics and buying behaviours of food-allergic consumers in Great Britain ...

    Authors: Stella Anne Cochrane, M Hazel Gowland, David Sheffield and René Wilfrid Robert Crevel
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:31
  8. The eliciting dose (ED) for a peanut allergic reaction in 5% of the peanut allergic population, the ED05, is 1.5 mg of peanut protein. This ED05 was derived from oral food challenges (OFC) that use graded, inc...

    Authors: Giovanni A Zurzolo, Katrina J Allen, Steve L Taylor, Wayne G Shreffler, Joseph L Baumert, Mimi L K Tang, Lyle C Gurrin, Michael L Mathai, Julie A Nordlee, Audrey DunnGalvin and Jonathan O’B Hourihane
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2013 9:35
  9. Wheat allergy is among the most common food allergy in children, but few publications are available assessing the risk of anaphylaxis due to wheat.

    Authors: Antonella Cianferoni, Karishma Khullar, Rushani Saltzman, Joel Fiedler, Jackie P Garrett, David R Naimi and Jonathan M Spergel
    Citation: World Allergy Organization Journal 2013 6:11
  10. The UK NICE guideline on the Diagnosis and Assessment of Food Allergy in Children and Young People was published in 2011, highlighting the important role of primary care physicians, dietitians, nurses and othe...

    Authors: Carina Venter, Trevor Brown, Neil Shah, Joanne Walsh and Adam T Fox
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:23
  11. Our aim was to investigate the factors that affect health related quality of life (HRQL) in adult Swedish food allergic patients objectively diagnosed with allergy to at least one of the staple foods cow’s mil...

    Authors: Sven-Arne Jansson, Marianne Heibert-Arnlind, Roelinde JM Middelveld, Ulf J Bengtsson, Ann-Charlotte Sundqvist, Ingrid Kallström-Bengtsson, Birgitta Marklund, Georgios Rentzos, Johanna Åkerström, Eva Östblom, Sven-Erik Dahlén and Staffan Ahlstedt
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:21
  12. Insufficient knowledge of food allergy and anaphylaxis has been identified by caregivers as an important barrier to coping, and a potential cause of fear and anxiety, particularly for those with children newly...

    Authors: Zainab B Abdurrahman, Monika Kastner, Cory Wurman, Laurie Harada, Laura Bantock, Heather Cruickshank and Susan Waserman
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2013 9:18
  13. We present two cases of food and exercise-induced anaphylaxis (FEIA) in patients with a diagnosis of oral allergy syndrome (OAS) to the implicated foods. Patient A had FEIA attributed to fresh coriander and to...

    Authors: Jennifer Yan Fei Chen, Jaclyn Quirt and Kihyuk Jason Lee
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2013 9:11
  14. A diagnosis of peanut allergy has a major impact on an individual’s quality of life. Exposure to even small amounts of peanut can trigger serious reactions. Common cleaning agents can easily remove peanut alle...

    Authors: Wade TA Watson, AnnMarie Woodrow and Andrew W Stadnyk
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2013 9:7
  15. Soya and peanut are botanically closely related and share cross-reacting antigens, but compared to soya, peanut allergy has a higher prevalence with more severe allergic reactions. Furthermore, the threshold d...

    Authors: Cecilia M Lund, Christina G Dirks, Mona H Pedersen, Bettina M Jensen and Lars K Poulsen
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2013 3:6
  16. The 11S globulin Sin a 2 is a marker to predict severity of symptoms in mustard allergic patients. The potential implication of Sin a 2 in cross-reactivity with tree nuts and peanut has not been investigated s...

    Authors: Sofía Sirvent, Martial Akotenou, Javier Cuesta-Herranz, Andrea Vereda, Rosalía Rodríguez, Mayte Villalba and Oscar Palomares
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2012 2:23
  17. Epicutaneous immunotherapy (EPIT) on intact skin with an epicutaneous delivery system has already been used in preclinical and clinical studies. In epicutaneous vaccination and immunotherapy, the stripping of ...

    Authors: Lucie Mondoulet, Vincent Dioszeghy, Emilie Puteaux, Mélanie Ligouis, Véronique Dhelft, Franck Letourneur, Christophe Dupont and Pierre-Henri Benhamou
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2012 2:22
  18. Allergy to peanuts results in severe anaphylactic responses in affected individuals, and has dramatic effects on society and public policy. Despite the health impacts of peanut-induced anaphylaxis (PIA), relat...

    Authors: Steven Maltby, Erin J DeBruin, Jami Bennett, Matthew J Gold, Matthew C Tunis, Zhiqi Jian, Jean S Marshall and Kelly M McNagny
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2012 8:15
  19. An understanding of the management strategies used by food allergic individuals is needed as a prerequisite to improving avoidance and enhancing quality of life. Travel abroad is a high risk time for severe an...

    Authors: Julie Barnett, Neil Botting, M Hazel Gowland and Jane S Lucas
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2012 2:12
  20. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of specific IgG4 antibodies to hen’s egg white and determine their utility as a marker for the outcome of oral challenge test in children sensitized to hen’s egg

    Authors: Shindou Okamoto, Shoichiro Taniuchi, Kyoko Sudo, Yasuko Hatano, Keiji Nakano, Tomohiko Shimo and Kazunari Kaneko
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2012 8:9

    The Erratum to this article has been published in Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2013 9:34

  21. Gluten intolerance is a condition which affects an increasing percentage of the world’s population and for which the only current treatment is a restrictive gluten free diet. However could the inclusion of a p...

    Authors: M Samil Kök, Richard Gillis, Shirley Ang, David Lafond, Arthur S Tatham, Gary Adams and Stephen E Harding
    Citation: BMC Biophysics 2012 5:10
  22. Cow’s milk and hen’s egg are the most frequently encountered food allergens in the pediatric population. Skin prick testing (SPT) with commercial extracts followed by an oral food challenge (OFC) are routinely...

    Authors: Zein Faraj and Harold L Kim
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2012 8:5
  23. The timing of complementary food introduction is controversial. Providing information on the timing of dietary introduction is crucial to the primary prevention of food allergy. The American Academy of Pediatr...

    Authors: Sara Leo, John Dean and Edmond S Chan
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2012 8:3
  24. The FAST project (Food Allergy Specific Immunotherapy) aims at the development of safe and effective treatment of food allergies, targeting prevalent, persistent and severe allergy to fish and peach. Classical...

    Authors: Laurian Zuidmeer-Jongejan, Montserrat Fernandez-Rivas, Lars K Poulsen, Angela Neubauer, Juan Asturias, Lars Blom, Joyce Boye, Carsten Bindslev-Jensen, Michael Clausen, Rosa Ferrara, Paula Garosi, Hans Huber, Bettina M Jensen, Stef Koppelman, Marek L Kowalski, Anna Lewandowska-Polak…
    Citation: Clinical and Translational Allergy 2012 2:5
  25. While most allergic responses to food are directed against protein epitopes and occur within 30 minutes of ingesting the allergen, recent studies suggest that delayed reactions may occur, sometimes mediated by...

    Authors: Hana Saleh, Scott Embry, Andromeda Nauli, Seif Atyia and Guha Krishnaswamy
    Citation: Clinical and Molecular Allergy 2012 10:5
  26. There are numerous, disparate guidelines for influenza vaccination in egg-allergic patients. We aimed to describe the outcome of selectively applied guidelines, based on risk-stratification, to our high risk, ...

    Authors: Julia Elizabeth Mainwaring Upton, David Brian Hummel, Anna Kasprzak and Adelle Roberta Atkinson
    Citation: Allergy, Asthma & Clinical Immunology 2012 8:2
  27. Cow's milk allergy is one of the most common food allergies among younger children. We investigated IgE antibodies to milk, and IgE and IgG4 antibodies to casein, α-lactalbumin and β-lactoglobulin in cow's mil...

    Authors: Komei Ito, Masaki Futamura, Robert Movérare, Akira Tanaka, Tsutomu Kawabe, Tatsuo Sakamoto and Magnus P Borres
    Citation: Clinical and Molecular Allergy 2012 10:1