Buckwheat allergy: proteins, reactions and how common it is
What it found
Buckwheat can cause immediate allergic reactions, including rare severe ones, and allergy clinic studies found confirmed buckwheat allergy in 2 to 7% of patients.
Population estimates put it at 0.1 to 0.4% in Japan, Korea and buckwheat-eating areas of China.
What they found
Studies in people
Cross-reactivity with other foods
Clinically relevant cross-reactivity has been described between buckwheat and latex, coconut, quinoa, peanut and poppy seed. No clinical studies were found on cross-reactivity between common and tartary buckwheat, though it could be expected.
How common in the population
Population estimates put buckwheat allergy at 0.1 to 0.4% in Japan, Korea and buckwheat-consuming areas of China. Among people with coeliac disease in the Stockholm area, 3.9% reported buckwheat allergy.
How common in allergy clinics
Studies of patients referred to allergy clinics in different countries found that 2 to 7% had confirmed buckwheat allergy. In some Korean and Japanese studies, reports of buckwheat allergy were more common than reports of wheat allergy in the general population, but less common among allergy clinic patients.
Severe reactions and anaphylaxis
Buckwheat-triggered anaphylaxis has been reported in many case reports, including two fatal cases. School studies from Japan and Korea found 4 to 60 cases of buckwheat-related anaphylaxis per 100,000 school children, and the incidence of severe allergic reactions to buckwheat can be estimated at 0.1 to 0.01 cases per 100,000 person-years.
Exposure routes
Reactions can happen when eating buckwheat food, when producing or handling buckwheat food at work, or when sleeping on pillows filled with buckwheat husks. One Swedish study found clinically diagnosed buckwheat allergy in 28% of workers who inhaled dust when repacking buckwheat grains and flour.
Animal and lab studies
Allergy proteins identified
Several allergenic proteins have been found in common buckwheat, including Fag e 1, Fag e 2 and Fag e 3, and in tartary buckwheat, including Fag t 1, Fag t 2 and Fag t 3. Fag e 1 and Fag e 2 are considered the main allergens in common buckwheat.
What the authors conclude
“Buckwheat allergy is a neglected allegy deserving further attention but severe allergic reactions are rare.”
Also in their conclusions
- They say buckwheat allergy is a neglected allergy deserving further attention, but that severe allergic reactions are rare.
- They advise that allergy doctors should be aware of buckwheat allergy.
- They note that buckwheat allergy is not a main food allergen but can be relatively common among allergy patients in some countries.
How it was done
The authors wanted to give an updated overview of different aspects of buckwheat allergy, since the first review on it was published in 1996 and later ones focused on single regions or on animals as well as people.
They searched the medical database PubMed for publications on buckwheat allergy from 1971 to 2020, plus some key older papers, and included studies of patients or population samples. The search found 166 articles, most published after 2000.
What it can’t tell you
- Most of the numbers come from allergy clinic patients or school surveys, so they cannot show what causes buckwheat allergy or how it develops.
- The review collects published studies of different designs and cannot prove cause and effect.
- Some findings come from single case reports, which cannot show how common a reaction is.
Who paid
- Conflicts
- The authors declare no conflict of interest.
- Authors work at
- Uppsala University, Sweden
The paper
- Title
- A Review on Epidemiological and Clinical Studies on Buckwheat Allergy
- Type
- ReviewThe authors read earlier studies and describe what they found. It isn’t a new study.
- Evidence
- Studies in people · animals · lab
- Summarised from
- Full text
- Licence
- CC BY. Words in quotation marks are the authors’; the rest is our summary.
- Cite
- Norbäck D, Wieslander G (2021). A Review on Epidemiological and Clinical Studies on Buckwheat Allergy. Plants (Basel, Switzerland). doi:10.3390/plants10030607Free full textPubMed 33806876DOI
Summary written 30 Sep 2026. Check it against the paper before it changes what you eat. How we summarise papers · Report an error