I personally suffer from food allergies. How can I reduce my child's risk of developing a food allergy?

Question

Hello, my baby is almost 6 months old and I want to be well prepared before giving him solid foods. As this is my first child, I have little experience on what food to give at what frequency to minimize the risk of allergy in my baby. Can you help me? Thanks for your response! And should my child have a food allergy test before I give him solid foods, since he is just at high risk for allergies, to be safer?

Thi Lan Thi Duong · Accepted Answer

Hello, To reduce a child's risk of food allergies, the key is to introduce foods that most commonly cause allergic reactions to your baby starting at 6 months of age, or even a little earlier but after 4 months in a child at high risk for food allergy. A child is considered high risk if eczema, asthma or food allergies run in the family, which is the case with your child. There are detailed instructions on when your child is ready for solid foods, specific recipes as well as allergic reactions to watch out for in the Food Allergy Canada guide that you can refer to later. In brief, the food sources responsible for the majority of allergies include eggs, cow's milk, peanuts, tree nuts, sesame, wheat, fish and soy. You can give one food at a time consecutively, and when you give your child a particular food and he or she does not have an allergic reaction, it is recommended that you continue to give it 2-3 times a week, which also helps prevent food allergies. In general, it is not recommended to test for food allergy right off the bat because in some cases, these tests can give false positives (results indicating that the child is allergic when this is not actually the case) and this can therefore restrict the variety of foods to "challenge" in the child. In this FAQs for families you will find answers from Food Allergy Canada to the most frequently asked questions on this topic if you ever have any further questions.  It is my pleasure, Lan Thi Duong, pharmacy student (supervised by Alexandre Chagnon, pharmacist)