Background and purpose: The principal aim of this study was to clarify the clinical profile of pediatric patients with fruit allergies.
Subjects and methods: We assigned 265 pediatric patients with fruit allergies who were receiving outpatient treatment at Aichi Children's Health and Medical Center and 32 who underwent kiwi or banana oral food chal- lenge (OFC) test to an oral symptom group or a systemic symptom group and retrospectively examined their clinical profiles and prognosis from their medical records.
Results: The most common cause of fruit allergy was kiwi (139 patients, 21% of all patients). Watermelon had the highest oral symptom induction rate (97%), whereas banana had the highest systemic reaction induction rate (46%). In the oral symptom group, the prevalence of hay fever was 54% and 66% of patients showed aller- gic reaction to multiple fruits. In contrast, in the systemic symptom group, the prevalence of pollen allergies was 24% and 77% of patients showed allergic reaction to a single fruit only. The results revealed that 65% of patients allergic to bananas had infant-onset allergy and seven among 20 patients were confirmed acquisition of tolerability by the OFC test.
Conclusion: Our data suggest that there is a difference in the clinical profile and disease type between patients with oral symptoms and those with primarily systemic symptoms. It is important to differentiate between these patients for accurate diet guidance, safety management, and prognosis estimation.
Keywords: fruit allergy; oral symptom; pollen-food allergy syndrome; pollinosis; systemic reaction.