Relación entre concentraciones de IgE e infecciones en pacientes con rinitis y asma alérgica

Background: High IgE levels are frequent in allergic patients. The relationship between allergy and infections is controversial. Some diseases with cellular immunodeficiencies as well as with infections have high IgE levels, such as: hyper-IgE, Netherton, Wiskott-Aldrich, DiGeorge syndromes, AIDS, etc. In a previous retrospective study we found a high percentage of concurrent infections (two or more simultaneous infections) in atopic patients with IgE levels above 200 IU (OR 3.31; CI 95% 1.3 to 8.04; p 200 IU) have more frequency of concurrent infections than patients with low levels. Patients and methods: In a cross sectional study we included patients with atopic rhinitis, asthma or both, in order to find upper and lower respiratory tract infections. Results: We studied 143 patients (IgE mean, 389.07; SD 606.21). IgE levels were higher in children (521.25 UI) than in adults (204.03 UI) (p < 0.05). 73.44% of the patients had sinusitis; 5.59% pharyngotonsillitis; 17.93% otitis, and 7.74% laryngitis, without IgE mean differences. 42.84% had concurrent infections (IgE 296.16 IU) vs 57.15% without this processes (460.4 IU) (p = 0.11). When IgE levels were classified in high and low levels, with 200 IU as end point, we did not find differences in the number of infectious diseases. Conclusions: In this study high IgE levels did not have correlation with the higher frequency of concurrent infections.