The principle of desensitization therapy is to identify the allergen of an allergic disease patient clinically and then inject a standardized preparation of the allergen into the patient subcutaneously repeatedly in small to large doses and in low to high concentrations to induce tolerance to the allergen and no longer produce an allergic reaction or reduce the allergic reaction. The WHO Opinion on Allergen Immunotherapy states that “desensitization is the only possible cure for allergic diseases” and is now being promoted in developed countries such as Europe and the United States. The European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI) affirms that desensitization therapy has the dual significance of preventing attacks and treating the cause of allergic diseases such as allergic asthma and allergic rhinitis, with long-lasting efficacy and few side effects. The Global Recommendations for Asthma Control (GINA) classifies desensitization treatment into treatment norms.
It is now believed that the standardized treatment of allergic diseases such as allergic rhinitis and allergic asthma should be a combination of pharmacological treatment and desensitization therapy. The symptoms of patients with allergic rhinitis and asthma are controlled by pharmacotherapy, while desensitization therapy can modify the disease evolution of allergic rhinitis and asthma and can improve the prognosis, such as preventing the development of allergic rhinitis into asthma by reducing sensitivity to allergens, reducing nasal and airway inflammatory responses, preventing irreversible airway inflammatory damage in asthma, reducing the amount of medication used by patients and improving the quality of life of patients, thus improve the prognosis of allergic diseases such as allergic asthma and allergic rhinitis, and potentially enable some patients with allergic rhinitis and asthma to be cured. As the only allopathic treatment currently recommended by the World Health Organization that can change the natural course of allergic diseases, desensitization therapy can reduce or even completely relieve the symptoms of allergic rhinitis or (and) asthma, and can reduce or even stop the use of allopathic drugs; it can prevent allergic rhinitis from developing into asthma or worsening asthma symptoms. According to statistics, only 5% of patients with allergic rhinitis develop allergic asthma after conventional desensitization therapy, while 23-68% of those who do not undergo desensitization therapy develop allergic asthma; it can normalize the immune system of patients, and the efficacy of the treatment is long-lasting.
These points are especially important for children with asthma. Long years of clinical practice have confirmed that desensitization therapy is more effective in children than in adults, and that appropriate desensitization therapy can greatly improve the long-term remission rate of children with asthma and prevent children with allergic rhinitis from developing allergic asthma. Desensitization also allows children with atopic qualities to become much more tolerant to the appropriate allergens, even for life.
Desensitization is indicated for patients with allergic rhinitis or (and) allergic asthma with dust mite allergy and consists of a dose-escalation phase and a dose-maintenance phase. The incremental phase is a gradual increase of the injectable dose over 4-6 months to reach the peak maintenance dose. The maintenance phase is a treatment in which maintenance doses are injected every 1-2 months for about 3 years.