If your child has asthma, you might wonder whether an underlying lactose intolerance is to blame, particularly with the prevalence of milk allergies. However, lactose intolerance and milk allergy are very different from one another. While milk allergy is sometimes associated with asthma, lactose intolerance is not. If the two coexist, it is likely coincidental.
Lactose
Lactose is milk sugar, a carbohydrate that is related chemically to starch and table sugar. Your cells can burn it for immediate energy or store it for later energy use. When you consume lactose, you break it into the smaller sugars glucose and galactose, explain Drs. Reginald Garrett and Charles Grisham in their book "Biochemistry." You then absorb these into the bloodstream.
Asthma
Asthma is a reactive airway disease that causes the small airways in the lungs to contract, reducing your ability to move air. This leads to wheezing, coughing, and in some cases, reduced airflow so severe as to be life-threatening. There are many asthma triggers; different asthma sufferers react to different triggers. Common triggers include airborne allergens such as pollen, mold, cold air and exercise. While asthma typically isn't diagnosed in babies due to the difficulty of doing pulmonary function tests on the very young, it's relatively common in children.
Lactose and Asthma
If your child has asthma, it has nothing whatsoever to do with an inability to process lactose or to lactose consumption. This is true even if your child is also lactose intolerant. Intolerances are different from allergies, explains the Asthma and Allergy Foundation. If you're lactose intolerant, it's because you can't break milk sugar down and absorb it, which leads to digestive symptoms. The proteins in milk can cause allergies, which can lead to asthma, but this is a different process.
Diagnosing Problems
If you suspect your child has asthma, a lactose intolerance, or both, you should see your pediatrician. Lactose intolerance is typically diagnosed by removing lactose from the diet and watching for improvement of symptoms. Asthma, on the other hand, requires extensive testing of pulmonary function, which is typically undertaken by an allergist or asthma specialist. While removing milk from your child's diet may help alleviate asthma symptoms, this isn't a result of removing the lactose from the diet.
References
- "Biochemistry"; Reginald Garrett, Ph.D. and Charles Grisham, Ph.D.; 2007
- Asthma and Allergy Foundation: Lactose Intolerance
