TOPLINE:

Shrimp allergy significantly affected quality of life (QOL) in adults — 81% reported their allergy as at least moderately troublesome, and 70% expressed interest in treatment options, particularly those aimed at achieving tolerance to a serving of shrimp.

METHODOLOGY:

• Researchers sought to determine how shrimp allergy affects QOL in adult patients and parents of children with shrimp allergy. Additionally, they aimed to assess demand for adult and pediatric treatments.
• Between September 30, 2023, and July 15, 2024, all participants completed an online questionnaire designed to capture QOL measures relevant to family and social activities, school attendance and participation, food preparation practices, health concerns, and emotional symptoms.
• They analyzed data from 86 participants divided into three groups: adults with shrimp allergy and no children with shrimp allergy (n = 64), adults with shrimp allergy and at least one child with shrimp allergy (n = 6), and adults without shrimp allergy but with at least one child with shrimp allergy (n = 16).

TAKEAWAY:

• Among adults with shrimp allergy, 81% found their condition at least moderately troublesome, and 83% reported that others underestimated the problems caused by shrimp allergy.
• Adults with shrimp allergy whose children were also allergic to shrimp had higher odds of worrying about allergic reactions than those whose children were not allergic to shrimp.
• Overall, 70% of adults with shrimp allergy expressed interest in treatment options, and 47% of those specifically wanted treatments that would enable consumption of a serving size of shrimp.

IN PRACTICE:

“[The] decreased QoL measures range from hypervigilance about the foods they/their child eat to exclusion or isolation at work or school,” the authors of the study wrote. “Preventative treatments like biological treatments, immunotherapy, or epitope vaccines would be helpful in the future, and more studies to mitigate the impact of SA [shrimp allergy] on QOL are needed,” they added.

SOURCE:

Carla M. Davis, MD, with Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, was the corresponding author of this study, which was published online on December 8 in Frontiers in Allergy.

LIMITATIONS:

This study was limited by its cross-sectional design, the inclusion of nonvalidated questions about shrimp allergy, and the absence of data on response rates. The lack of demographic data may have limited the generalizability of the responses, and the small subgroup of adults with shrimp allergy who had children also allergic to shrimp may have affected the interpretability of the results.

DISCLOSURES:

This study was funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The authors declared having no conflicts of interest.

This article was created using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication.