Food allergies can not be prevented

Exists a list of 120 foods that can cause food allergies to children. The most common are milk, eggs and nuts, but also fish and shellfish and, after 5 years, fruits, vegetables and legumes. Food allergies can not be prevented and begin with the introduction of new foods in the diet of children.

For this reason, it is advisable to give the children new foods one at a time in order to be able to clearly determine which one produces the allergy. But, What is food allergy? A series of adverse reactions that occur after the ingestion of a food and that are triggered by an immune mechanism mediated by antibodies called 'immunoglobulin E' (IgE).

Food allergy in figures

In figures, food allergy affects between 3 and 6 percent of children under 3 years old and disappears as children grow older. Thus, at 5 years, 80% of children tolerate cow's milk, in the case of eggs, at 4 years they tolerate 50% and at 6 years 66%. However, in some cases there is a hypersensitivity of children that makes allergies disappear in the case of some foods, but appear in relation to others.

Santiago Quirce, head of the Department of Allergology, says that among the most common symptoms of food allergies, skin manifestations account for 66 percent of reactions, which occur with redness, inflammation or hives. Other symptoms are digestive, such as vomiting, and in the most severe cases, respiratory symptoms are difficult to breathe.

How to identify a food allergy

1. Food allergies can not be prevented: In many cases a hereditary factor intervenes since if one of the parents or both are allergic there is a greater risk that the trait will pass to the children. In addition in these cases its appearance is usually sequential, first appears that of milk, then that of the egg and later even if the above ones can appear others associated with plant proteins. Some of these cases enter into what is called 'atopic gait' and are parallel to the development of atopic dermatitis, rhinitis and asthma after 5 years.

2. The symptoms are clear: These allergies do not go unnoticed to parents. When a cause-effect relationship is observed between food intake and adverse skin reactions or vomiting, parents should go to the pediatrician. If the reactions are more mild or diffuse and involve digestive discomfort, it could be a food intolerance, in which some physical failure intervenes to process some type of food component but not the immune system.

3. After the step by the pediatrician the diagnosis is made by the allergist: the current tests based on IgE antibodies are very reliable and are performed at the skin and blood levels. When they are to be performed through the consumption of the food, the test is carried out in a controlled manner in hospital facilities.

4. Allergies are continually evolving in children: This means that IgE levels must be controlled periodically and that a progressive reintroduction of the allergen food is always attempted in the hospital. In addition, in children with some type of food allergy such as cow's milk should be more vigilant to the possibility that the allergy spreads to other foods.

5. Parents should learn to avoid food: This is easy to eliminate in its full form of the diet but many of these allergens are used in processed products to provide flavor or color or the products have been packed in factories where there may be traces of allergens. In most cases these foods are notifiable on the labeling but when eating out of the house you have to be alert and always ask at the restaurant for the composition of the dishes and report the child's allergy for possible handling of the food.

6. Before a possible reaction you have to know how to act: Parents, caregivers and older children should know the symptoms and follow a protocol of action provided by doctors. In mild cases, antihistamines are usually used, but when the reaction is so severe that it endangers the child's life, automatic adrenalin autoinjectors are used that parents provide to the school and always carry on trips with the child or at home. After a reaction of these characteristics, parents should go to the hospital with the child.

7. Some figures about food allergies: hospital admissions for severe allergic reactions in children have multiplied sevenfold in the last decade.

Marisol Nuevo Espín