Skip to main content
  • Meeting abstract
  • Open access
  • Published:

Mechanisims of asthma and allergic disease – 1075. Probiotics in infants for prevention of allergic disease and food hypersensitivity

Background

Probiotic (‘healthy’ bacteria) added to infant feeds have the potential to prevent sensitisation of infants to dietary allergens.

Methods

Standard methods of the Cochrane Neonatal Review Group were used. Searches were updated October 2011. Randomised and quasi-randomised controlled trials that compared a probiotic to control; or probiotic with added prebiotic (synbiotic) to control were eligible.

Results

Sixteen studies were eligible. Several ongoing studies and completed studies with no reported allergy results were identified. Eight studies reported adequate randomisation and allocation procedures and used a placebo. Only one study reported <10% losses after allocation. Overall, meta-analysis of 12 studies found a significant reduction in infant eczema (1876 infants; RR 0.77; 95% CI 0.67, 0.89; RD -0.07; -0.12, -0.03; NNT 14; 8, 33] from use of probiotic. Moderate (I2=32%) heterogeneity between studies was found. In subgroup analysis, a significant reduction in eczema was found in infants selected for risk of allergy and unselected infants; infants predominately breast fed; infants treated with L. Rhamnosus (3 studies, 542 infants, RR 0.61; 0.45, 0.82); infants treated with a combination probiotic B. bifidum, B. lactis and L. acidophilus (1 study, 68 infants; RR 0.58; 0.34, 0.97); and infants given a synbiotic (1 study, 925 infants; RR 0.81; 0.66, 0.99). There was no significant difference in all allergy, asthma, atopic eczema, allergic rhinitis, or food hypersensitivity.

Conclusions

Further evidence is required before a probiotic or synbiotic can be recommended for prevention of allergy. A well powered, independent trial is required to answer this question.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Sinn, J. Mechanisims of asthma and allergic disease – 1075. Probiotics in infants for prevention of allergic disease and food hypersensitivity. World Allergy Organ J 6 (Suppl 1), P72 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1186/1939-4551-6-S1-P72

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/1939-4551-6-S1-P72

Keywords