Eczema and peanut allergy: is there a link?

Babies with eczema have a 20% chance of developing a peanut allergy, a potentially life-threatening condition, by their second birthday.

Currently one in 70 children in the UK is allergic to peanuts. So what can you as a new mum do to prevent your child from developing the allergy?

Current guidelines indicate that avoiding peanuts early in infancy will prevent peanut allergy from developing later in childhood.

So why then is peanut allergy on the rise? Should we avoid peanuts completely or should they be an integral part of our children’s diets?

These questions are the subject of a ground-breaking research study under way at the Evelina Children’s Hospital at St Thomas’ Hospital, London.

The LEAP (Learning Early About Peanut allergies) Study aims to shed new light on how and why peanut allergy develops.

Led by Professor Gideon Lack, a world-expert in paediatric allergies, the randomised, controlled, seven-year study will involve 480 high-risk children (with eczema, egg allergy or both) aged between four months and 11 months.

Each child is randomly assigned to follow one of two approaches.

Children in the avoidance group follow a diet that steers clear of all peanut-containing foods until the age of three.

In the consumption group, parents are asked to give their child an age-appropriate peanut snack three times per week.

The study findings will very likely influence public health policy to prevent food allergies. They will also enable scientists to identify important treatment targets to try and develop cures for children who already suffer from a peanut allergy.

Parents of children under 11 months old who have eczema and/or egg allergy who are interested in taking part in the study can get more information at www.leapstudy.co.uk or by calling 0800 234 6522.

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