Parental Depression Linked to Children's Allergy

Filed in archive Allergy: Research and Development on June 12, 2006

It seems that not only may depression lead to diabetes, a study shows that children from parents who suffer from major depression and other anxiety disorders may have higher risks of developing allergies. And the link seems to be biological, and more associated to mothers.

A statistically significant association between major depression and panic attacks in parents and allergic disorders in children was seen only in biological parent-child pairs.

Further, in analyzes restricted to biological parent-child pairs, the association between parental major depression and panic attacks and childhood allergy-based disorders was statistically significant only in mothers.

The author of the study which was published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine says that the findings suggest that there might be common genes responsible for depression/panic disorders and allergic disorders.

Well, come to think of it, a link between psychological/emotional state and allergies does make sense. Afterall, a lot of allergy patients claim that they are most likely to suffer from severe allergy symptoms, particularly those who have eczema, when they are under stress.

It's a long shot, considering that these are not experimental, but rather survey data, but who knows? Maybe this is the start of a novel approach to drug discovery for treating allergies (and depression).