Pediatric anaphylaxis: unresolved issues of diagnosis and patient management

Abstract

The incidence of anaphylaxis is increasing in children. Children suffering from anaphylaxis represent a complex and ambiguous group of patients. The factors that cause difficulties in diagnosing anaphylaxis in children are as follows: a wide range of triggers, unpredictability of the nature, severity of clinical symptoms of systemic reactions, and their age-dependent interpretation. The first anaphylactic reaction always stuns parents and medical staff, which leads to a subjective description of the anamnesis and a delay in making a diagnosis and prescribing the correct treatment. For these patients, problems such as the lack of available diagnostic tests for verifying the diagnosis of anaphylaxis, restriction of standard doses of epinephrine autoinjectors, lack of predictors of the occurrence, and severity of systemic allergic reactions continue to be relevant. The article focused on the most urgent difficulties and features of managing patients with anaphylaxis in pediatric practice and discussed possible prospects and ways to solve them.