The Role of Complementary Feeding in Food Allergy Prevention

Complementary feeding plays a critical role in the prevention of food allergy, and the evidence in this area has evolved considerably over the past decade. Historically, the advice to parents of infants at high risk of allergy was to delay the introduction of allergenic foods including peanut, egg, and tree nuts until after the first year of life. However, large well-designed clinical trials have shown that delaying introduction can increase the likelihood of developing food allergy, whereas early, exposure during a defined window of immune development promotes oral tolerance.