Allergy to laboratory animals: epidemiologic, clinical, and physiologic aspects, and a trial of cromolyn in its management.

A survey was conducted by personal interview with all identified subjects in a large medical center who had regular exposure to laboratory animals. Of 399 subjects, 59 (15%) had symptoms suggestive of allergy to laboratory animals. Such allergy was more likely to occur in subjects with previously known allergies, especially to domestic pets, and was most likely to become manifest within a few months of the first exposure. In the group with allergy to laboratory animals, nasal symptoms were invariably present and tended to precede pulmonary symptoms, which occurred in half of the group. Twelve subjects with pulmonary symptoms were challenged by exposure to laboratory animals and each had immediate bronchospasm by objective criteria. Half of these also had bronchospasm which persisted or recurred 5 hr or more after challenge. A double-blind controlled trial in 10 subjects with laboratory animal-induced bronchospasm showed that prior use of cromolyn offered considerable or complete protection against both immediate and late bronchospasm in all subjects but one.