NEW YORK – (Reuters Health) – Psychological stressand anxiety can make seasonal allergy attacks worse and lingerlonger, according to research presented Thursday at the annualmeeting of the American Psychological Association in Boston.

“People may be setting themselves up to have more persistentproblems by being stressed and anxious when allergy attacks begin,”Dr. Janice Kiecolt-Glaser, professor of psychology and psychiatryat Ohio State University in Columbus noted in a telephone interviewwith Reuters Health ahead of the meeting.

To gauge how stress and anxiety affect allergy sufferers,Kiecolt-Glaser and colleagues recruited 28 men and women with ahistory of hay fever and seasonal allergies to participate in alaboratory study.

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