A Preliminary Study on Cross-Reactivity of Heat-Treated Quail and Hen’s Egg White Proteins in Young Children

Abstract

We investigated the effects of different types of heat treatments on hen’s egg white (HEw) and quail egg white (QEw) proteins and their cross-reactivity in young children. Crude extracts of raw and water-boiled HEw and QEw and commercially developed stone-baked HEw were prepared. Sodium dodecyl sulfate–polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) was then performed. Patients diagnosed with HEw allergy were enrolled, and pooled sera were tested with each extract in an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)-inhibition test. A skin prick test (SPT) and oral food challenge (OFC) were also performed. The median age of 12 patients was 2.5 years. SDS-PAGE results revealed strongly stained bands for the ovomucoid of boiled HEw and QEw, while stone-baked HEw displayed remarkable changes for all protein fractions. In the ELISA-inhibition test, pre-incubation of the sera led to a profound decrease, moderate decrease, and minimal decrease in the amount of IgE binding to boiled and raw HEw, boiled and raw QEw, and stone-baked HEw proteins, respectively. SPTs and OFC demonstrated cross-reactivity values of 41.7% (5/12) and 16.7% (2/12) for boiled QEw and stone-baked HEw, respectively. We observed moderate cross-reactivity between QEw and HEw. Boiling had a limited effect on altering egg allergenicity. Commercially developed, stone-baked HEw can be an alternative food for children with HE allergy.

Guided Gradual Egg-Tolerance Induction in Hen's Egg Allergic Children Tolerating Baked Egg: A Prospective Randomized Trial

“…Surprisingly, the ovalbumin content of hard-boiled egg was lower compared to the extensively heated oven baked egg. This is contrary to SDS-PAGE results of hard-boiled egg white in previous studies ( 20 , 27 , 28 ). However, as opposed to our SDS-PAGE results, which were further confirmed by ELISA, the bands of ovalbumin and ovomucoid overlapped in previously published work, which could have made it difficult to identify the allergens separately ( 20 , 27 , 28 ).…”

Clinical cross‐reactivity to quail’s egg in patients with hen’s egg allergy

“…Four of the remaining 8 patients with negative SPT results underwent OFC using boiled QEw, and one reacted. 5 In our study, 92% of HE-allergic patients had positive SPT results to raw QEw; all participants underwent QE-OFC, and 45% reacted.…”

“…However, there are only one report on serological cross-reactivity between HE and QE, 3 and two reports on clinical cross-reactivity. 4,5 Therefore, whether all HEallergic patients need to avoid QE consumption remains unclear. This study aimed to evaluate the clinical cross-reactivity between HE and QE by performing oral food challenge (OFC) tests.We conducted a prospective study to determine whether HEallergic patients show clinical cross-reactivity to QE.…”

Clinical Features of Quail Egg Ingestion in Patients with Acquired Tolerance to Hen Eggs: A Case Series Study

“…Previous studies have indicated that for cross-antigenicity to elicit allergic reactions, there should be a protein sequence similarity of at least 70% among the allergens [4, 6]. Case series investigating the serological cross-antigenicity between hen and quail eggs have reported substantial sequence homology in the proteins of these eggs, as revealed by the sera of the majority of the patients [7, 8]. This indicates the potential for clinical cross-reactivity between hen and quail eggs.…”