View Report Details

A clinical trial to investigate potential alergic reaction from ingestion of storage mites

Project Code: T07007

01/03/2012

University Hospital of South Manchester
Pearson, D

Occupational allergy in workers involved in grain handling and associated industries is often caused by storage mite allergens. More recently non-occupational sensitisation to storage mites has been reported via ingestion of mites in flour and other foodstuffs containing flour.

Sensitisation of this type can cause severe anaphylactic responses in individuals and may explain some cases of unknown food allergy.

The results showed that between 9.2 to 17.3% of individuals were sensitised to specific storage mites. Allergy to storage mites was not considered to be due to cross-reactivity between storage and house dust mites, although it was acknowledged that this might occur. The researchers concluded that the current level of contamination of UK foods with storage mites did not pose a high risk of triggering severe allergic reactions.

Final report

Some of the files on this site may be in a format that your computer can't read. However, you can download Readers and Viewers for the following document types below: