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Developing Primary Intervention Strategies to Prevent Allergic Disease

  • Immunotherapy and Immunomodulators (B Vickery, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Allergic diseases are a major cause of morbidity in the developed world, now affecting up to 40 % of the population with no evidence that this is abating. If anything, the prevalence of early onset allergic diseases such as eczema and food allergy appears to be still increasing. This is almost certainly due to the changing modern environment and lifestyle factors, acting to promote immune dysfunction through early perturbations in immune maturation, immune tolerance and regulation. This early propensity to inflammation may also have implications for the rising risk of other inflammatory non-communicable diseases (NCDs) later in life. Identifying risk factors and pathways for preventing early onset immune disease like allergy is likely to have benefits for many aspects of human health, particularly as many NCDs share similar risk factors. This review focuses on recent advances in primary intervention strategies for promoting early immune health and preventing allergic disease, highlighting the current evidence-based guidelines where applicable and areas requiring further investigation.

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Acknowledgments

SP is supported by a Practitioner Fellowship from the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) of Australia.

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Conflict of Interest

Susan L. Prescott declares that she is on the boards of Nestlé Nutrition Institute and Danone and has received speaker fees and travel expenses. She has also received speaker fees and travel expenses from ALK Albello. Kristina Rueter and Aveni Haynes declare no conflicts of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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Correspondence to Susan L. Prescott.

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Kristina Rueter and Aveni Haynes are joint first authors of this review article

This article is part of the Topical Collection on Immunotherapy and Immunomodulators

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Rueter, K., Haynes, A. & Prescott, S.L. Developing Primary Intervention Strategies to Prevent Allergic Disease. Curr Allergy Asthma Rep 15, 40 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11882-015-0537-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11882-015-0537-x

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