Allergy sufferers get mentally ill more often

Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.

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Allergies aren't just a nuisance. They put the immune system on alert. This could be the reason why people with hay fever or allergic asthma are more likely to develop mental illnesses. There has been evidence for a long time that inflammatory processes in the body also increase the risk of depression or anxiety disorders.

66 percent higher risk of mental suffering

Researchers led by Prof. Wu-Chien Chien from the Tri-Service General Hospital in Taiwan have evaluated the data from more than 180,000 people, around 47,000 of whom suffered from an allergic disease. Over a period of 15 years, 14,000 of the participants developed a mental disorder such as depression, anxiety disorder or schizophrenia.

Overall, 10.8 percent of the allergy sufferers, but only 6.7 percent of the allergy-free participants developed a mental illness. That corresponds to a higher risk of 66 percent.

Inflammatory processes harm the soul

Asthmatics who took anti-inflammatory drugs for asthma fell ill less often than other asthma patients. This would support the hypothesis that the inflammatory processes, if they are not contained, contribute to the development of mental illness. The stress that an allergic disease can spread could also have an adverse effect on mental stability and at the same time worsen the allergy symptoms.

Atopic dermatitis not affected

It remains unclear why, of all people, patients who suffered from neurodermatitis even had emotional problems less often than non-allergic people. This skin disease also belongs to the allergic group of forms. Neurodermatitis, in particular, can put a lot of psychological stress on the patient because of the visible skin symptoms.

Doctors who treat allergy sufferers should therefore pay particular attention to symptoms of mental illness, the researchers recommend.

Allergies in Germany

Allergies have increased significantly in industrialized nations over the past few decades. It is not yet clear why this is so. According to the Robert Koch Institute, 28 percent of adults currently suffer from hay fever, a contact, food or insect venom allergy. In addition, there are five to six percent of adults who suffer from asthma.

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