Milk allergen therapy success continues

Research led by the Johns Hopkins Children's Center has shown that after participating in desensitisation treatment, some children with a history of severe milk allergy can continue to drink milk and consume other dairy products every day without suffering severe reactions.

The latest results come from a follow-up of 18 children aged 6 to 16 who had participated in an earlier study. In that study, published in 2008, the milk-allergic children were given increasingly higher doses of milk over time. For many of them, this continuous exposure to the milk proteins appeared to gradually retrain their immune systems to better tolerate the substances that had previously triggered severe immune reactions.

Of the 18 children who could tolerate increasingly higher doses of milk in the initial study, 13 took part in follow-up food challenges, up to 17 months later. Of the 13, six showed no reaction after drinking the equivalent of almost two glasses of milk. Seven children developed mild symptoms including itchy mouth, hives, sneezing and mild abdominal pain, but none suffered serious reactions.

The findings of the follow-up study suggest that regular intake of milk and dairy foods may be needed for children to maintain their tolerance. The investigators suggest that some people may be truly cured of their allergy, while in others the immune system adapts to regular daily exposure to milk and may actually need frequent exposure to continue to tolerate it.

Reference: Narisety et al. 2009. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. DOI: 10.1016/j.jaci.2009.06.025