Wearable patch offers hope for toddlers with peanut allergy, say UCC team
Authors concluded that significantly more toddlers with peanut allergy became desensitised after 12 months of treatment with the peanut skin patch than with a placebo patch
A breakthrough trial could offer new hope to toddlers with peanut allergies, according to researchers at University College Cork (UCC).
The international trial, published in the , involved a wearable patch that could prevent severe allergic reactions in toddlers.
The team at UCC worked with institutions around the world to conduct a trial of the Viaskin peanut patch in children aged between one and three years old who had been diagnosed with a peanut allergy.
The patch delivers peanut allergens to the skin.
The late-stage trial found after a year of wearing the patch for 22 hours a day, almost seven in 10 children were able to tolerate the equivalent of one to four peanuts.
The authors concluded that significantly more toddlers with peanut allergy became desensitised after 12 months of treatment with the peanut skin patch than with a placebo patch.
The patch, which is a form of epicutaneous immunotherapy, has the potential to offer a new, breakthrough science that will modify a person's underlying food allergy.
It achieves this by re-educating the immune system to increase tolerance to allergens.
Avoidance of peanuts has previously been the standard approach to managing the allergy but accidental exposures can happen and can have potentially deadly results.
An oral form of peanut allergen immunotherapy was approved in the US in 2020 for patients aged between four and 17 years while treatment with patch-based immunotherapy has shown safety and efficacy in older children.
However, it is thought immune modulation may be more effective at a younger age.
The immune system in toddlers has a plasticity that can theoretically allow for higher efficacy and longer-lasting benefits from allergen immunotherapy after the therapy has stopped.
"These results are encouraging and give new hope to toddlers and their families who currently have no approved treatment options and who must instead focus on avoidance, which can impact quality of life," said paediatric allergist at CUH Dr Juan Trujillo.
Peanut allergy is the most common food allergy in children in Europe, yet there are limited treatment options for peanut allergy and no CE-approved options for children younger than four.
"It is only through clinical trials we will be able to determine if new treatments are effective and safe in young patients with peanut allergies," said Dr Trujillo who is the lead investigator at INFANT Research Centre and Clinical Research Facility at UCC.
"My commitment to this type of treatment with the support of CRF-UCC, INFANT and the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health has allowed us to get new clinical trials and support for further projects to come."
The allergy research centre at UCC and CUH is one of the top recruiters of the clinical trial, positioning it as one of the biggest centres of peanut immunotherapy research in Europe.
