Journal article
Does eczema in infancy cause hay fever, asthma, or both in childhood? Insights from a novel regression model of sibling data
JL Hopper, QM Bui, B Erbas, MC Matheson, LC Gurrin, JA Burgess, AJ Lowe, MA Jenkins, MJ Abramson, EH Walters, GG Giles, SC Dharmage
Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology | Published : 2012
Abstract
Background: The atopic march hypothesis proposes that eczema precedes the development of asthma and allergic rhinitis. Objective: We sought to assess the evidence for a causal effect of infantile eczema on childhood hay fever, asthma, or both. Methods: We used parental reports on infantile eczema and childhood asthma and hay fever for 3778 pairs of 7-year-olds matched to their sibling closest in age within 2 years from the Tasmanian Longitudinal Health Study. We analyzed paired sibling data using a logistic regression model that allowed inference about a causal effect of a familial predictor on a child's outcome by examining the change in association with their cosibling's predictor after ad..
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Funding Acknowledgements
[ "This study was conducted under the auspices of the Tasmanian Asthma Foundation, which is funded by the Department of Health Services and run by the school medical officers and school health nurses. Data entry of the 1968 baseline study was supported by the Victorian Asthma Foundation. M.C.M., A.J.L., L.C.G., S.C.D., and J.L.H. are currently supported by the National Health and Medical Research Council as a Career Development Award (CDA) Fellow, Post-doctoral Fellow, CDA Fellow, Senior Research Fellow, and Australia Fellow, respectively.", "Disclosure of potential conflict of interest: M. J. Abramson has received research support from Pfizer. The rest of the authors declare that they have no relevant conflicts of interest." ]