title: Allergy in Hong Kong: an unmet need in service provision and training.
abstract: Many children in Hong Kong have allergic diseases and epidemiological data support a rising trend. Only a minority of children will grow out of their allergic diseases, so the heavy clinical burden will persist into adulthood. In an otherwise high-quality health care landscape in Hong Kong, allergy services and training are a seriously unmet need. There is one allergy specialist for 1.5 million people, which is low not only compared with international figures, but also compared with most other specialties in Hong Kong. The ratio of paediatric and adult allergists per person is around 1:460 000 and 1:2.8 million, respectively, so there is a severe lack of adult allergists, while the paediatric allergists only spend a fraction of their time working with allergy. There are no allergists and no dedicated allergy services in adult medicine in public hospitals. Laboratory support for allergy and immunology is not comprehensive and there is only one laboratory in the public sector supervised by accredited immunologists. These findings clearly have profound implications for the profession and the community of Hong Kong and should be remedied without delay. Key recommendations are proposed that could help bridge the gaps, including the creation of two new pilot allergy centres in a hub-and-spoke model in the public sector. This could require recruitment of specialists from overseas to develop the process if there are no accredited allergy specialists in Hong Kong who could fulfil this role.
authors.affiliation: Division of Clinical Immunology, Department of Pathology and Clinical Biochemistry, Queen Mary Hospital, Pokfulam, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Y T
authors.initials: YT
authors.lastname: Chan
authors.affiliation: Department of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, Queen Mary Hospital, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: H K
authors.initials: HK
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.affiliation: Private practice, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Christopher K W
authors.initials: CK
authors.lastname: Lai
authors.affiliation: Division of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology, Department of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: C S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Lau
authors.affiliation: Department of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, Queen Mary Hospital, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Y L
authors.initials: YL
authors.lastname: Lau
authors.affiliation: Allergy Centre, Hong Kong Sanatorium and Hospital, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: T H
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Paediatrics, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prince of Wales Hospital, Shatin, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: T F
authors.initials: TF
authors.lastname: Leung
authors.affiliation: Department of Paediatrics, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prince of Wales Hospital, Shatin, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Gary W K
authors.initials: GW
authors.lastname: Wong
authors.affiliation: Private practice, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Y Y
authors.initials: YY
authors.lastname: Wu
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000486:Allergy and Immunology / Q000193:education; D002648:Child; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006723:Hong Kong / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D006967:Hypersensitivity / Q000453:epidemiology*
keywords: Health care facilities, manpower, and services; Hypersensitivity; Needs assessment