title: The psychosocial impact of an activity holiday for young children with severe food allergy: a longitudinal study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Food allergy has been shown to severely affect quality of life (QoL) in children and their families. The Anaphylaxis Campaign U.K. supports families with allergic children and as part of that support ran an activity holiday for those with food allergy. This study investigated the effectiveness of this activity holiday for reducing anxiety and improving QoL and food allergy management for these children.
  
  
  METHODS
  Measures were taken at baseline, at the start of the activity holiday, at the end of the holiday, at 3 and 6 months follow-up. Children (n = 24) completed a paediatric food allergy-specific QoL questionnaire (PFA-QL), a generic QoL questionnaire (PedsQL, the Spence Children's Anxiety Scale (SCAS) and the children's health locus of control (CHLC) scale at all stages of the study.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were significant improvements in social QoL, food allergy-specific QoL, total CHLC and internal locus of control scores over time (p > 0.05). There were significant decreases in powerful others locus of control, total anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder scores (p < 0.05). Greater anxiety significantly correlated with poorer QoL at all time points; no correlations with locus of control were significant at the 3- and 6-month follow-up.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The activity holiday was of significant benefit to the children who took part, providing support for the need for activity holidays such as this for children with severe food allergy. Ways in which adaptive locus of control and improved quality of life can be facilitated need to be further explored.
authors.affiliation: Psychology, Faculty of Education, Health and Sciences, University of Derby, Derby, UK. r.c.knibb@derby.ac.uk
authors.forename: Rebecca C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Knibb
authors.forename: Jonathan O'B
authors.initials: JO
authors.lastname: Hourihane
mesh_terms: D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*; D002648:Child; D018450:Disease Progression; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005512:Food Hypersensitivity / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000523:psychology*; D006693:Holidays / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007899:Leisure Activities / Q000523:psychology*; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D009771:Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011788:Quality of Life; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D006113:United Kingdom