The Biggest Takeaway from AAAAI 2019

Previous meetings have discussed food allergy, but not in this nature. In the first segment of an interview series with MD Magazine®, Edwin Kim, MD, MS, and Scott Commins, MD, PhD, colleagues from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, discussed how the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) 2019 Annual Meeting’s theme of food allergy prevention and treatment was highlighted by progression.

The progression, they noted, mainly comes from the advance of therapies that finally allow a food allergy patient the benefit of choice.

MD Mag: What’s the most important topic at AAAAI 2019?

Kim: I think one of the things that I've noticed is, it is all about food allergy—but different than previous years, where it really was about, “Are there treatments and can they work?” It seems to be more accepting that they probably do work, and more about, “How do we actually implement this, and who are the right patients for this?”

So it seems to be a lot of discussions about the risks, the implementation and choosing patients. I think that’s one of the things that I've noticed.

Commins: The idea that you hit on, about there being personal choice is really important. Some of this also is the idea of, perhaps not everyone needs therapy, and some people may be fine with avoidance. So, how do we bring that into the fold?

Kim: In the Presidential Plenary, Dr. (Wesley) Burks kind of brought that up I think nicely, because I feel like in the previous meetings, they really never gave avoidance as an option. It was really about, “Is this treatment better than that treatment?”

But it was sort of a reminder that no treatment now may be the right choice for some of these folks, depending on what their lifestyle is and what their risk tolerance might be.