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Abstract Background: An important activity of the mucosal surface is the production of secretory IgA that serve as 1st line of defense to repel pathogenic organisms. IgA deficiency is linked to the development of GIT food hypersensitivity and increased susceptibility to food allergy. IgA also prevent the development of allergic inflammatory reactions to environmental allergens. Objectives: to find a correlation between secretory IgA deficiency and food allergy which aids in understanding the pathogenesis of food allergy. Subjects and methods: a randomized cross sectional case control study that was carried out on 90 children in the pediatric hospital Ain Shams University. Cases enrolled in our study were children of age group from 1 month up to 3 years old who were already diagnosed with food allergy following in the GIT clinic. Fecal secretory IgA was measured for both groups. Results: Results reveals highly significant difference regarding level of secretory IgA being lower in cases with 24% than controls 6.7%. The frequency of recurrent chest infections and hospital admissions were much higher (64%) in the secretory IgA deficient group in comparison to the non-deficient group ((25%) and (15%) respectively while the figures of recurrent GE was even higher (92%) among those with SIgA deficiency. Conclusion: secretory IgA deficiency was more frequent among CMPA patient suggesting it has a role in the development of food allergy which should be studied further. |