Prevalence of allergic sensitization to bee, mosquito and red ant in children with allergic disease

Abstract

Background: The allergic sensitization to insects of the Hymenoptera and Culicidae order in pediatric population is studied with low frequency. Objective: To determine the prevalence of sensitization to bees, mosquito and fire ants in children with allergic diseases. Material and method: A retrolective and descriptive study was carried out in a pediatric allergy service. The registers of the cutaneous reactivity to bees, mosquitos and fire ants done among January 2009 to December 2011 were analyzed. The frequency of sensitization to insects and its confidence interval to 95% was estimated. Results: The sample included 613 patients, 41% were girls. The age average of the group was 6.2 ± 3.7 years. The allergic sensitization to mosquito was 15% (CI 95%: 12.4-18.1), bees 14.2% (CI 95%: 11.4-16.9) and fire ants 6% (CI 95%: 6.0-6.8) older that non-sensitized, 7.1 vs 6.0 years old (p=0.011) and 7.4 vs 6.1 years old (p=0.042), respectively. During fall and winter seasons, fire ant sensitization was observed with more frequency. Conclusions: In our knowledge this is the first report in Mexico related with sensitization frequency to bees, mosquitos and fire ants carried out on children. Also, our results suggest that sensitization to these insects should be identified more often.

Keywords

• abejas
• Culicidae
• himenópteros
• hormigas
• niños