Dog Dander

🇺🇸 History in the United States

Dog dander extracts were part of American allergists' testing panels from the early decades of the 20th century, but for most of that time the extracts were crude, highly variable, and sometimes contaminated with dust-mite allergen, which produced false-positive results documented in the US literature into the 1990s. The specific major allergen, Can f 1, was purified and characterized in 1991 by Schou, Svendsen, and Lowenstein, and in 1997 Konieczny and colleagues cloned Can f 1 and Can f 2 and showed both are salivary lipocalins, enabling standardized recombinant reagents. Meanwhile dog ownership in the US grew steadily through the postwar suburban boom to the point where well over one-third of American households keep dogs, making dog allergen, like cat allergen, essentially ubiquitous in US house dust. Measurements in US homes from the 1990s-2000s (e.g., the JACI study of current mite, cat, and dog allergen exposure and pet ownership) found Can f 1 in nearly all sampled dwellings, including homes without dogs, spread via clothing and shared spaces. A 2012 JACI study of Can f 1 levels across breeds found no evidence for any hypoallergenic dog breed, overturning popular US marketing claims. National surveys (NHANES 2005-2006) found dog-specific IgE in roughly 12% of the US population, and dog sensitization is a recognized risk factor for childhood asthma.