Unexpected cause of dyspnoea in a patient with allergic rhinitis.

ABSTRACT

A defect in one part of the immune system may affect the whole system. As a result, there may be a myriad of immunological diseases, which are often masked with the one disease that has the most prominent symptoms. This case report presents a patient with long-lasting allergic rhinitis who recently developed dyspnoea in exertion with suspected asthma development. After extensive diagnostic processing, asthma was dismissed, and diagnosis of selective IgA deficiency and coeliac disease with consequential iron deficiency anaemia was established. The patient was treated with parenteral iron and a gluten-free diet, which corrected her anaemia and led to the disappearance of dyspnoea. This paper aims to show the interplay between different immunological disorders and the possible causal connection between them.