Trends und Risikofaktoren von Asthma und allergischen Erkrankungen bei Kindern und Jugendlichen in Deutschland Schlussbericht

The influence of exposure and living conditions on the development and manifestation of asthma and allergies in childhood was investigated taking advantage of the historically different, but since the German unification in 1990 rapidly assimilating conditions in the East and West of Germany. The project had three parts: 1. cross-sectional surveys in Dresden, Leipzig and Munich (1995/96) according to the phase II protocol of the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) to determine the prevalence of these diseases; 2. case-control studied in Dresden and Munich (1996/97) to further investigate the aetiology of asthma; 3. a repetition (1995/96) of a survey in Leipzig (1991/92) to investigate time trends in disease prevalence. A total of more than 17.000 children were studied. The partly very demanding study instruments included parental questionnaires, skin prick tests, skin examination, lung function measurements and bronchial challenge, and measurements of serum IgE levels and indoor allergen exposure. In this report disease prevalence rates, the role of investigated potential risk factors, and the observed increase in prevalence of hay fever and atopy among children in Leipzig are presented and discussed. (orig.)SIGLEAvailable from TIB Hannover: F00B308 / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekBundesministerium fuer Bildung und Forschung (BMBF), Bonn (Germany)DEGerman