Children Asthma Statistics and Food Intolerance in Children
Many children are living with asthma. Asthma is a lung disease because the constriction of small airways (bronchioles). When this happens, there is moderate to severe difficulty in breathing came with by wheezing. Even though wheezing is not always heard but most of the time it is always present.
Asthma symptoms and attack is often accompanied by a respiratory tract infection. If an infection is present, there is a chance of a fever. When fever happen, patients are needed to consult a doctor as antibiotics may be needed in addition to the normal asthma medicine.
One of the earliest studies to link children asthma and food intolerance or food allergy in children was published in 1992. In 279 children with asthma, 168 experienced wheezing in double-blind placebo-controlled food challenges. The foods in this study that triggered wheezing were: peanut (19); milk (18); egg (13); tree nuts (10); soy (2); wheat (2); legumes (beans) (2); and turkey (1). In all cases the wheezing occurred within 2 hours of the children’s having eaten the test foods. The children with asthma in the study were all known to be allergic to the foods, and had other symptoms that indicated their allergic reactions status.
Another study of asthma triggered by foods identified six culprit foods in order of their prevalence in triggering the allergic reaction as follows: (1) egg; (2) milk; (3) peanut; (4) wheat; (5) soy; and (6) fish.
In most cases of food-associated asthma in children, the asthma symptoms rarely occur alone. This is because additional symptoms of allergy are triggered when the offending food is ingested. Food-induced anaphylaxis is the most dramatic example of the involvement of multiple organ systems in responding to food allergy.
The relationship between food allergy and asthma is most obvious in children (as opposed to adults), and is strongest in the youngest of the young subjects. In a group of milk-allergic babies with mean age of 10 months, 29 percent of 27 infants had lung responses typical of asthma on challenge with milk.
Certain types of food ingredients and food additives that cause a non- immunological reaction in the body (food intolerance) can make asthma worse. Artificial food colors called azo dyes, especially tartrazine (which is yellow); preservatives such as sulfites and benzoates, and forms of these chemicals that occur naturally in some foods; and salicylate (which is the active ingredient in aspirin), are chemicals that may enhance the asthmatic response to allergens in a child who is sensitized to them.
The reaction of asthmatics and allergies to these chemical compounds is not an allergy, but is more correctly described as an intolerance because the initial response is not a triggering of the immune system. The process involves an increase in the level of the inflammatory mediators that are responsible for the bronchospasm of asthma. These mediators include histamine and leukotrienes.
They are released during the reaction to an allergen, and cause the muscular contractions that result in the difficulty in breathing and wheezing that are typical of asthma. By inhibiting (or turning off) other types of mediators, the chemicals in the food additives cause an increase in the level of histamine and leukotrienes. This results in increased bronchospasm, and a definite worsening of the asthma symptomsb.
By avoiding the food ingredients and additives that are responsible for this type of enhancement of an allergic reaction, an asthmatic child will not lose his or her asthma. However, an asthmatic child who does have an intolerance to these chemicals will definitely benefit from avoiding them because their asthma symptoms will be less severe than when they are eaten frequently.