I've come across a few items of interest in the past few months concerning the prevention, rather than treatment of allergies in cats and dogs. The methods described both rely on giving the immune system early exposure to antigens, thereby inducing a state of tolerance before signs develop.  Wouldn't it be great if we could program the immune system to prevent signs of atopic dermatitis?

1.  The Swedish company Premune aims to commercialize a product to activate the immune system of puppies at an early age. The company's web site suggests that the product might include a Staphylococcus superantigen. The concept is based on work in children that found that early exposure to bacteria and gut colonization with Staph aureus is associated with a lower risk of developing allergies later. I see that they are exhibiting at the European Society of Veterinary Dermatology meeting next month, so I hope to learn more!

2.  Heller and colleagues published an interesting article in the March 2014 issue of Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology entitled "Neonatal aerosol exposure to Bermuda grass allergen prevents induction of experimental allergic feline asthma: Evidence for establishing early immunologic tolerance." Contrary to the authors' hypothesis, repeated neonatal aerosol exposure to Bermuda grass allergen did not induce allergy. Instead, it protected the kittens from the airway eosinophilia that developed in the control kittens when challenged with a standardized sensitization technique at 6 months of age! It was a cool study and it is worth keeping an eye on this work out of the Comparative Internal Medicine Laboratory at the University of Missouri.

These interesting prevention modalities derive from the hygiene hypothesis, which attempts to explain why children that grow up on farms, with pets, and in more rural environments are less likely to develop allergies. 

Wouldn't it be interesting to see if RESPIT could prevent atopic dermatitis in high-risk puppies?