But a new study could change that. Researchers at Monash University in Australia are working on a dust-mite vaccine that, if successful, would have the potential to cure sufferers in just two to three doses. Professor Els Meeusen is applying her experience in infectious disease vaccines to the world of allergy. She believes the addition of a new ingredient into the vaccine could be the magic bullet allergy sufferers have been waiting for.

Allergic Living’s Kim Shiffman spoke with Els Meeusen to find out what that ingredient is, and when the vaccine might be available.

Why focus on immunotherapy as a treatment for dust mite allergy?

It’s the only treatment that could be a cure. All the others are just to keep allergic symptoms under control, but they don’t cure anything.

How would your vaccine be different than the one that’s been available for years?

The current house dust mite allergy vaccine is given at continuously increasing doses over a period of years. You have to be very careful giving it – it can be a little bit dangerous to use because it’s not well known how it works, and if you don’t use it properly, it could cause a serious reaction. It’s also not quite clear if or when it’s going to start working, and there are no clear markers to actually assess if it’s working.

What our work will do is try to speed up the vaccine effect, a bit like in the work I do with infectious diseases, where you only have to give two or three injections before you get good immunity. If we can achieve the same immune deviation – changing the immune system by vaccination using the same principles as infectious diseases – then we may be able to have a more effective and quicker vaccination regime for house dust mite allergy.

Next Page: More questions on the vaccine

You can’t see them, but they’re all over your home. Dust mites will be in the carpet, the sofa, the bedding, the curtains, even a child’s stuffed animals. These tiny insects, visible only under a microscope, leave a trail of waste that is a highly allergenic.

It’s estimated that between 10 and 25 per cent of North Americans are sensitized to dust mite droppings, and that these pests will spark wheezing in over 50 per cent of asthmatics. Thankfully, while you can’t get rid of dust mites completely, you can minimize their multiplying numbers.

What They Are

Dust mites, cousins to the spider, are tiny, eight-legged arachnids measuring only one-quarter to one-third of a millimetre in size. They spend their two to four months of life eating, creating waste and reproducing. A female will lay 100 eggs in her lifetime, and each mite produces about 10 to 20 waste pellets a day.

They are whitish in color, and thrive in warmth (between 24 and 26 degrees C; 75 and 80 degrees F) and humidity higher than 50 per cent. Mites eat minuscule flakes of human skin and animal dander. They can’t drink, but absorb moisture from the atmosphere.

Where They Live

Dust mites prefer a plentiful supply of skin flakes or animal dander, moisture and warmth. This is why you’ll find the highest concentration of mites in your bed. An average mattress contains between 100,000 and 10 million bugs.

A study in 2000 found that more than 45 per cent of American homes had detectable dust mite levels associated with the development of allergies, and 23 per cent had bedding with concentrations of allergen high enough to trigger asthma attacks.

Next Page: What You Can Do