Foreword

Article Outline

• Copyright

Several years ago, environmental mold was a very hot topic in my home state of Texas. A homeowner (ironically, from the town of Dripping Springs) was awarded $32.1 million in a mold-related suit against her insurance company, and litigation related to mold has since become a profitable cottage industry. More recently, exposure to flooded homes following hurricanes Katrina and Rita again returned environmental mold exposure to the front pages. As a result, parents may come into your office concerned about whether they might have mold in their houses, or whether their child’s symptoms could be caused by molds. In this issue of Current Problems in Pediatric and Adolescent Health Care, associate editor Ruth Etzel provides a thorough discussion of the syndromes that have been associated with common environmental molds. As she points out, the data are slim for many of these associations, but pediatricians need to be aware of these possibilities, particularly when dealing with patients with puzzling symptoms. As always, taking a thorough history that includes questions about the child’s environment is the key to discovering these potential explanations. This is a rapidly changing field. Read this issue to get a good grounding in the topic, and for further information, visit both the CDC (www.cdc.gov) and the EPA (www.epa.gov) web sites, which are frequently updated with new information as it becomes available.