Mode of Birth Is Not Associated With Food Allergy Risk in Infants.

Background: The association between mode of delivery and the risk of food allergy remains unclear due to the absence of studies with both challenge-proven food allergy outcomes and detailed information on the type of caesarean delivery.

Objective: We assessed whether emergency or elective caesarean, or caesarean delivery in the presence or absence of labor initiation, is associated with the risk of food allergy.

Methods: The HealthNuts study recruited 5276 12-month-old infants who underwent skin prick testing and oral food challenge to ascertain food allergy status, and linked the child's study data to additional birth data from the Victorian Perinatal Data Collection.