The Winter 2019 issue of AllerGen Success Stories features two stories on findings from the CHILD Study.
“All in Good Time” discusses with CHILD Founding Director Dr. Malcolm Sears his 2017 research that found delaying the introduction to infants of various potentially allergenic foods (specifically, cow’s milk, egg white, and peanut) made it more likely that those children would become allergic to those foods.
Wait a year before introducing peanuts to your allergy-prone baby. Better yet, wait three years. Avoid eating eggs while you’re breastfeeding. No, eggs are fine. But definitely keep your baby away from dairy. Introduce some foods early yet breastfeed exclusively for six months. Confused yet? Imagine the turmoil for new parents trying to protect their babies from developing food allergies.
“Anxious Mom, Allergic Kid?” examines a connection elucidated by Dr. Anita Kozyrskyj and her team: how a mother’s distress during and after pregnancy can lead to her child’s developing an allergy.
As anyone who has been around children knows, babies instantly pick up on their mothers’ moods. Mom smiles, baby smiles. Mom’s upset, baby fusses. Mom is stressed out … baby gets an allergy? Is that even possible, and how might it work? AllerGen investigator Dr. Anita Kozyrskyj, a professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Alberta, is looking for answers to these questions.
Success Stories is a periodical published by the AllerGen NCE Network, one of CHILD’s main funders, to share research discoveries from across the network with the Canadian public.
