RESULTS
A total of 98 EoE patients aged ≥ 7 years old were screened. Twenty patients were excluded from the study because of lost to follow-up, unreachability, and neurodevelopmental disorder. Finally, seventy-eight patients (74.4% male) with a median age of 13.5 years (IQR:8 years) were included in the study. (Figure 1). Unpleasant and recurrent symptoms that were distinct from dysphagia with certain foods were described in 13 patients (76.9% male). (Figure 1). The median age at the onset of symptoms of these 13 patients was 12.5 years (IQR: 7 years). All of them had concomitant allergic rhinitis (AR) (23.1% perennial, 76.9% seasonal) and two patients had ongoing IgE-mediated food allergy (patient 9: anaphylaxis with tree-nuts, patient 12: anaphylaxis with fish).
The symptoms existed before and after the EoE diagnosis in 10 patients (77%) and three patients (23%), respectively. Almost all patients described oropharyngeal itching and tingling. The most common triggering foods were kiwi and hazelnut, respectively. The median time from food ingestion to symptom onset was five minutes (IQR: 4 minutes), and the median duration of symptom relief was 30 minutes (IQR: 15 minutes) (Table 1).
PFAS was diagnosed in 12 patients, and FIRE in one patient (Figure 1). This patient (patient 10) was a 16-year-old girl who described narrowing and pressure in the retrosternal area after consuming pickled but not fresh cucumber on repeated exposures. She had not experienced a similar complaint before the diagnosis of EoE. The triggering foods of PFAS were different from the ones responsible for anaphylaxis in two patients (patient 9 and patient 12).