Latex Allergy — What About Protection?

lic. rat. med. Jerzy A. Kozłows­ki

Latex aller­gy affects not only health­care work­ers but also pro­fes­sion­als in oth­er occu­pa­tions where hand pro­tec­tion from bio­log­i­cal fac­tors and con­t­a­m­i­nants is nec­es­sary. Sin­gle-use latex gloves are the most com­mon form of pro­tec­tion; how­ev­er, due to the fre­quent occur­rence of latex aller­gies, not every­one can use them. What are the symp­toms of latex aller­gy, and what alter­na­tives are avail­able?

Latex Allergy — Key Information

The first descrip­tions of hyper­sen­si­tiv­i­ty reac­tions to latex in the form of con­tact urticaria and Quinck­e’s ede­ma date back to 1927 and were described by G. Stern and A. Grimm [1]. How­ev­er, the prob­lem of latex aller­gy was rel­a­tive­ly small and did not arouse wide­spread inter­est, and even before 1980, aller­gy to latex pro­teins was rare [2]. With the increas­ing preva­lence of latex prod­ucts, the num­ber of aller­gic reac­tions also rose. The first descrip­tion of latex glove aller­gy dates back to 1992, and the first descrip­tion of fatal expo­sures to latex occurred in the ear­ly 1990s [1].

W pop­u­lacji ogól­nej częs­tość alergii na lateks ksz­tał­tu­je się w grani­cach 0,66–18,3% (częs­to wskazy­wany jest przedzi­ał od 1% do 6% ogól­nej pop­u­lacji) [3], a anafi­lak­sji 0,4%. Częs­tość anafi­lak­sji na lateks w warunk­ach około­op­er­a­cyjnych wynosi aż 20%. W przy­pad­ku pra­cown­ików ochrony zdrowia częs­totli­wość alergii w zależnoś­ci od badań wynosi od 5,9% do 18,3% [1].

Latex Allergy — Hypersensitivity Reactions.

  • Con­tact der­mati­tis result­ing from irri­ta­tion is the most com­mon latex aller­gy caused by gloves. It is caused by sweat­ing hands, skin irri­ta­tion from the mate­r­i­al, the pres­ence of soap and anti­sep­tic residues on the skin. Pow­der in pow­dered gloves can dry out and irri­tate the hands. All of these fac­tors togeth­er pro­duce typ­i­cal symp­toms of irri­ta­tion and latex aller­gy: red­ness, swelling, dry­ness, peel­ing skin, the for­ma­tion of sores, and pim­ples.
  • Delayed-type latex aller­gy is less com­mon but has a more gen­er­al­ized char­ac­ter and is asso­ci­at­ed with greater dis­com­fort. Rash­es in the areas of con­tact and on the fore­arms appear up to sev­er­al hours after con­tact with the aller­gen.
  • Imme­di­ate aller­gic reac­tions are the most dan­ger­ous, although it depends on their sever­i­ty. Imme­di­ate aller­gic reac­tions can man­i­fest as hives and skin inflam­ma­tion, but latex aller­gy symp­toms can also be more seri­ous: run­ny nose, con­junc­tivi­tis, bronchial asth­ma, angioede­ma, gen­er­al­ized reac­tions, and even ana­phy­lac­tic shock [3].

The at-risk group pri­mar­i­ly includes indi­vid­u­als who have fre­quent con­tact with latex prod­ucts, espe­cial­ly health­care work­ers, patients, beau­ti­cians, and indi­vid­u­als per­form­ing tasks that require hand pro­tec­tion. Even indi­vid­u­als with min­i­mal con­tact with latex can devel­op aller­gies, espe­cial­ly patients with spina bifi­da and asso­ci­at­ed spinal cord her­ni­a­tion (SCDH), who are pre­dis­posed to latex aller­gies. The fre­quen­cy of symp­to­matic latex aller­gy in this group is as high as 31% [1].

What gloves for latex-allergic individuals?

It’s worth con­sid­er­ing desen­si­ti­za­tion, which can be effec­tive but does­n’t pro­vide a 100% guar­an­tee. It is rec­om­mend­ed to use non-aller­genic gloveswith nitrile gloves being the most pop­u­lar choice, which not only match but in some aspects even sur­pass latex gloves. Anti-aller­gic nitrile gloves  are wide­ly used in med­ical pro­ce­dures, includ­ing those requir­ing pre­ci­sion and main­tain­ing an asep­tic envi­ron­ment. Nitrile gloves offer the same lev­el of tight­ness and resis­tance to viral pen­e­tra­tion as latex gloves, but they are less stretch­able, so it’s impor­tant to choose the right size for full com­fort.

Learn more about com­par­isons of prop­er­ties of diag­nos­tic and pro­tec­tive latex and nitrile glovesand also an arti­cle about Dif­fer­ences between latex, nitrile, and vinyl gloves.

Regard­less of whether gloves cause aller­gies or not, it’s impor­tant to remem­ber the prin­ci­ples of hand skin pro­tec­tion, espe­cial­ly wash­ing hands after remov­ing latex gloves. To do this, use a neu­tral pH soap and mois­tur­iz­ing creams. It’s also help­ful to use pro­tec­tive creams before putting on gloves, which can be an effec­tive method of pro­tec­tion against aller­gens. This cre­ates a bar­ri­er between the skin and the gloves [3]. How­ev­er, these creams should not con­tain min­er­al oils as they can weak­en the gloves’ structure​.

Bibliography:

1. Katarzy­na Gem­b­ka, Ewa Cichoc­ka Jarosz, „Aler­gia na lateks – czyn­ni­ki wywołu­jące, symp­to­ma­tolo­gia i postępowanie”, Aler­gia Ast­ma Immunolo­gia 2013, 18 (3): 151–163;

2. Maciej Kowalews­ki, Marek L. Kowal­s­ki, „Aler­gia na Lateks”, Aler­gia Ast­ma Immunolo­gia, 1997, 2(2), s. 78–86;

3. Wiesława Kamińs­ka, „Aler­gia na lateks u pra­cown­ików służ­by zdrowia i możli­woś­ci jej ogranicza­nia”, Bez­pieczeńst­wo Pra­cy 3/2002, s.4–7;

4. Mar­ta Chełmińs­ka, „Aler­gia na lateks – część 1”, Pneu­monol. Aler­gol. Pol. 2004, 72, 143–149;

5. Doro­ta Dzi­uban, Paweł Kowal­czyk, Maciej Filocha, „ Ciem­na strona pra­cy – alergie zawodowe”,Borgis – Medy­cy­na Rodzin­na 3/2011, s. 62–67;