Play-Doh and uncooked pasta are classic classroom craft supplies -- but what if the kids in the classroom have celiac disease?

Gluten in these substances is not dangerous, new research finds. As long as kids with celiac disease don't eat what they're playing with, we can strike Play-Doh and raw pasta from the exposure risk list, the researchers said.

Other school supplies li...

You suddenly break out in a rash or your throat gets scratchy. You assume you're allergic to something … maybe pollen or a detergent. But could you be allergic to something in your food or medicine, and how could you tell?

The medical community disagrees as to whether additives in food or even medications -- such as dyes, preservatives or emulsifiers -- cause true allergic reac...

Asthma or allergies can put a damper on holiday gatherings. But there are ways you can stay healthy, the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology says.

"Everyone wants this time of year to be picture-perfect. But when there are runny noses, itchy eyes and sneezing involved, the picture is less than ideal. There are steps you can take to make your celebrations more fun and jo...

People with peanut allergy must be constantly vigilant to avoid a life-threatening allergic reaction. But researchers report that a new drug injection might offer at least temporary protection against the most severe reactions.

Just one shot of an experimental antibody treatment allowed people with severe peanut allergy to eat about one peanut's worth of peanut protein two weeks late...

Almost 41 million American children will don costumes and go trick-or-treating tonight, so all parents should remember that not every treat is safe for their kid.

Inspect your children's candy haul for signs of tampering before you let them eat anything, said Bruce Ruck, managing director of the New Jersey Poison Control Center at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School's department of emer...

Certain eating habits, high levels of stress and exposure to pollution are among the greatest factors associated with acne, researchers say.

They studied links to acne in more than 6,700 people from six countries in Europe and the Americas. The analysis showed that many more people with acne consume dairy products each day than those without acne -- 48.2% versus 38.8%.

More than 1.5 million children and adults in the United States have sesame allergy -- more than previously believed, a new study finds.

And even though sesame allergy can cause severe reactions, sesame is often not declared on food product labels, the Northwestern University researchers said.

In the United States, sesame labeling is not required by law as it is with eight ot...

Two young patients -- one 3 and the other 13 -- have a rare condition that calls for a highly restricted diet. Both have so much trouble eating that they developed an eating disorder and required feeding tubes, a new report shows.

Such is the fate of some of those with eosinophilic esophagitis (EOE), a chronic inflammatory disease that affects the tube running from the mouth to the st...

A common type of skin bacteria may put young children with severe eczema at increased risk for food allergies, British researchers report.

This type of bacteria, Staphylococcus aureus, is found in the nose and skin of healthy people, but it's more common in people with the skin condition eczema, especially those with severe cases.

This study found that young children...

The idea behind immunotherapy for peanut allergy is appealing in its simplicity: Ask a patient to eat tiny amounts of peanut every day, and over time their immune system will become desensitized to it.

Unfortunately, this cure might be doing more harm than the allergy itself, a new evidence review suggests.

People who undergo immunotherapy for their peanut allergies wind up with...

You might be surprised to learn that food allergies can start in adulthood and involve a food you've eaten without a problem for your entire life.

For adults as well as kids, the top -- but not the only -- food culprits are eggs, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, fish and shellfish, wheat and soy, according to the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.

Just as with chi...

Allergies to vaccines are extremely rare and even when they do occur, allergists can safely administer vaccines, Canadian experts report.

Immunoglobulin E (IgE) allergies that cause hives, swelling, wheezing or anaphylaxis occur in only 1 of 760,000 vaccinations.

Such a reaction typically starts within minutes of a shot, is unlikely to occur after 60 minutes, and is highly u...

It's a scary statistic: Every three minutes, an allergic reaction to a food sends someone to the emergency department, according to the nonprofit group Food Allergy Research & Education.

Food allergies affect one in every 13 children under age 18. Eight foods account for the majority of all reactions: milk, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, soy, wheat, fish and shellfish.

Scien...

Allergic reactions to peanuts can be incredibly dangerous, causing the throat to close, the chest to tighten, and throw a person into life-threatening anaphylactic shock.

But researchers now believe they've found a way to head off that immune reaction by blocking the antibodies that cause it.

There appear to be two specific allergens in peanut proteins that produce the most ...

New parents worry about a lot of things, but the American Academy of Pediatrics says one thing they can cross off that list is concern about giving high-allergy foods too early in life.

In fact, the pediatric group says it's likely better to introduce foods like peanut butter when kids are around 6 months of age.

"There's no reason to restrict early introduction to allergeni...

More than 90 percent of the medications that Americans take contain an inactive ingredient that could cause an allergic reaction, a new study suggests.

Lactose, peanut oil, gluten and chemical dyes are added to drugs to improve taste, prolong shelf life, improve absorption or make the drug tamper-proof, researchers explained. But they can also spell trouble for patients who are allerg...

An egg allergy is no joke, but some children who have it could safely eat eggs after immunotherapy treatment, a new study claims.

"Egg allergy is one of the most common food allergies and usually appears in early childhood. It has significant risk for severe allergic reactions and negatively affects quality of life for children with the allergy," said first author Dr. Edwin Kim, direc...

Researchers have added to a growing body of evidence that skin plays a major role in food allergies.

Their study of 62 children with eczema found that those with food allergies had skin irregularities not present on others.

Those irregularities included a lack of structural proteins needed to retain moisture and produce an effective skin barrier; increases in certain keratin...

Certain tick bites can cause a red meat allergy, and now scientists are shedding new light on the condition, known as alpha-gal syndrome.

Alpha-gal is a sugar found in most mammal blood, but not in humans.

"Our original hypothesis was that humans developed the allergy after being exposed to alpha-gal through a tick that had fed on a deer, dog or other small mammal that has ...

Immunotherapy for peanut allergy, where patients are fed tiny bits of peanut to help curb the allergy, might work better if patients continue to eat small amounts of the nut after completion of therapy, new research shows.

These findings suggest that "eating these small amounts of peanut is safe, can improve quality of life, and may help to maintain desensitization" to the peanut alle...

More than 10 percent of U.S. adults have a food allergy -- and nearly double that believe they do, a new study estimates.

Researchers found that 19 percent of those surveyed thought they had a food allergy. But when the investigators dug into people's symptoms, they found that only 10.8 percent reported "convincing" signs of a true allergy.

Experts said the findings highligh...

Avoiding certain foods during pregnancy does not reduce your child's risk of food allergies, a new analysis shows.

For the study, researchers examined data from a 2005 to 2007 survey of 4,900 pregnant women who were part of a U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study.

Nearly 3 percent of the women said they restricted certain food...

Holiday get-togethers can be risky for people with food allergies.

About 15 million people in the United States have one or more food allergies.

"It's unfortunate that there's been such an uptick in food allergy diagnoses, but the good thing is people are talking about it and there's not as much stigma as there was previously," said Dr. Kara Wada, an allergy and immunology p...

Researchers say they've identified a potential link between food allergies and flare-ups of multiple sclerosis.

"Our findings suggest that MS patients with allergies have more active disease than those without, and that this effect is driven by food allergies," said study author Dr. Tanuja Chitnis, an MS specialist, and colleagues.

Multiple sclerosis is a disease of the cen...

Almost 8 percent of American children have food allergies, and 1 in 5 of those kids suffers an allergic reaction severe enough to wind up in the hospital, a new study finds.

"Childhood food allergies are relatively common and should be taken seriously, with 1 in 5 having a reaction that takes them to the emergency room every year," said lead researcher Dr. Ruchi Gupta, a professor of...

People with peanut allergy can protect themselves from an allergic reaction by consuming a small amount of peanut powder every day, a new study suggests.

The "breakthrough" findings mean this new treatment is ready for review by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the researchers added.

"We're excited about the potential to help children and ad...

When you have serious food allergies, eating at a restaurant can literally mean risking your life. But new research suggests you can take steps to protect yourself when dining out.

In fact, the more steps you take to protect yourself from exposure to the allergic substance, the less likely you are to have an allergic reaction, the study found.

The researchers asked 39 people...

Milk allergy affects more than half of American infants who have food allergies in their first year of life, a new study finds.

However, study lead author Christopher Warren said, "Our findings suggest that while milk allergy is relatively common during infancy, many children are likely to outgrow their milk allergies.

"We observed that while an estimated 53 percent of food-...

Your EpiPen will still work after being frozen, researchers report.

The epinephrine auto-injector can be lifesaving in cases of severe allergic reaction, and millions of Americans carry the devices.

In this study, researchers "took 104 same-lot pairs of [EpiPens] and froze one of each pair for 24 hours, while the other was kept at recommended temperatures as a 'control,' " s...

Giving trace amounts of wheat to children with wheat allergy shows promise in treating the allergy, according to new research.

The researchers started with 46 wheat-allergic children, average age about 9 years, and gave them trace amounts of wheat. The researchers gradually increased the amount, to desensitize the children to wheat. This process is called oral immunotherapy.

Allergies and asthma can make the start of the new school year a challenge for kids who aren't prepared to deal with flare-ups, an allergist warns.

"Every age group is different in how much they can handle when it comes to protecting themselves from flare-ups due to allergies and asthma while at school, as well as severe allergic reactions from food allergi...

A severe allergic reaction to food is much less serious in infants than in toddlers and older children, a new study concludes.

"We found that infants, unlike older children, have a low-severity food-induced anaphylaxis, which should come as reassuring news to parents who are about to introduce their baby to potentially allergenic foods like peanuts," said study author Dr. Waheeda Sam...

Children with autism are more likely to also have a food, respiratory or skin allergy, new research suggests.

What's not clear from the new study, however, is whether there's a common cause behind these conditions.

"More research is needed to determine whether there is a causal relation between allergies and autism, or something else causes both conditions," said senior stu...

Lots of things grow in the spring, including your risk of severe allergic reactions and asthma attacks. So people need to take preventive measures and know when to seek medical care, an emergency physician says.

"Spring tends to bring more people to the emergency department," Dr. Paul Kivela, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians, said in a college news release.

While allergists have long known that farm life helps prevent allergies in kids, new research shows the benefit might even extend to adults who live near a farm.

The findings "are indicative of potentially beneficial health effects of living in close proximity to farms," said a team led by Dr. Lidwien Smit, of Utrecht University in the Netherlands.

One U.S. expert said the s...

An experimental peanut-allergy vaccine proved effective in mice, researchers say.

The vaccine protected allergic mice from reactions such as itchy skin and breathing problems when they were exposed to peanuts two weeks after their final vaccine dose, according to the University of Michigan researchers. The vaccine is administered by nose in three monthly doses.

The researche...

Babies who are given antacids or antibiotics during their first 6 months of life may have a sharply higher risk for allergies or asthma, a large new study warns.

The finding is based on an analysis of health records of more than 792,000 children born between 2001 and 2013.

While the study does not prove that the medications cause allergy, lead author Dr. Edward Mitre said th...

Though doctors recommend an early introduction to peanuts, many new moms prefer to delay giving them to their babies, researchers report.

Allergy experts now say that infants should be exposed to the allergen by the time they are 4 to 6 months old.

"Food allergies are scary, so it's understandable that parents would hesitate to introduce a food they might see as dangerous,"...

Food allergies are common among American kids, with nearly one-third of U.S. school nurses reporting at least one severe reaction to food among their students in the last school year, a new survey finds.

But the survey, of more than 200 school nurses nationwide, also uncovered some good news.

Ninety-six percent of the nurses said school staffers had been trained on how to ha...

Asthma and allergies can put on damper on your Valentine's Day romancing, an expert warns.

"Keeping everyone free of allergy and asthma flare-ups helps keep the focus on romance this Valentine's Day. Red or itchy eyes, runny noses, coughs and fatigue can ruin your celebration," Dr. Bradley Chipps, president of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI), said in a c...

About 5 percent of American children and 4 percent of adults have a food allergy, but many more are getting unnecessary testing.

Specific blood and skin prick tests can help detect food allergies. But the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases recommends them only for people who've had immediate allergic reactions, have a certain type of inflammation of the esophag...