Going Nuts for Oral Immunotherapy

               Americans eat an estimated total of seven hundred million pounds of peanut butter every year.  However, about three million Americans are unable to consume peanut butter or any products containing peanuts due to peanut allergies.  Even though it seems impossible for these people to ever have peanut products, new research is experimenting with oral immunotherapy.  Said oral immunotherapy would slowly and increase these people’s tolerance to peanuts in a safe way.

               A trial to test the oral immunotherapy with peanut allergies was tested on ninety-nine children between the ages of seven and sixteen.  This trial took place for six months and had a placebo control.  The researchers first tested to see the patient’s threshold for the allergy.  The patients were then given a small dose, obviously lower than what their allergy reacts to and did this every day.  After two weeks of continuing this, they would increase the amount.  This trend would continue up until being increased nine times.  After twenty-six weeks, eighty-four percent of the patients were able to consume five peanuts a day while sixty-two percent could tolerate up to ten peanuts a day.

               Although results seem promising and beneficial in the patients’ allergies, the oral immunotherapy concept has yet to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.  Even though the thought of people being able to “grow out” of their peanut allergy, it is also a scary idea as well.  The doctors have urged parents not to do this at home but of course, I am sure there will be many cases of parents and children trying to do the oral immunotherapy at home and on their own without doctor’s orders or supervision.  The oral immunotherapy would be beneficial because the amount of peanuts consumed would be less than the needed to agitate the symptoms in the patient, therefore causing no harm.  However, if parents do this at home, they will not know the necessary limit for their child and have a high chance of accidently going over their child’s limit.

               Also, although this is under the supervision of doctors, the oral immunotherapy may not always work for all patients.  Some of the patients may still have side effects or reactions as they increase their daily peanut dosage, resulting in not fun side effects.  Also, in order to have a set amount for daily intake, the doctors must test the patients to see their threshold which in result would give them the stomach troubles, rashes, breathing irritations, etc. that they avoid by not eating peanuts.  It’s a hard concept to grasp: whether to possibly put your child in harms’ way in order to make their life a little easier in the long run or go along with the allergy and the pains of not being able to eat certain foods.

"Peanut Facts - Texas Peanut Producers Board." Texas Peanut Producers Board. Texas Peanut Producers, 2016. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Sicherer, S. H. "Result Filters." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine, Apr. 1999. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Kwan, Nicole. "Oral Immunotherapy for Peanut Allergies Shows Promise, Study Finds | Fox News." Fox News. FOX News Network, 30 Jan. 2014. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.