Is your child's food allergy real? Tests trigger false alarms

[HuckleB]

http://www.physorg.com/news186052453.html

" Food challenges take place every Friday at St. Louis Children's Hospital. Children who have tested positive for food allergies are pitted against the suspected culprits. They spend hours eating increasing amounts and monitored closely for reactions. In about half the cases, nothing happens. The children are fine to eat the food many have been avoiding for years.

"Parents are very happy because it's a life change," said nurse Tricia Ruhland. They no longer have to analyze food labels, agonize over accidental exposure or send special snacks to school. Many, she said, head straight from the doctor's office to Dairy Queen for a Peanut Buster Parfait.

Food allergies are often misdiagnosed, leaving many parents needlessly worrying about dangerous reactions and painstakingly monitoring food, said Dr. Leonard Bacharier, director of pediatric allergy and immunology at Washington University School of Medicine. "It's a big, ugly issue. We deal with it every day."

A key reason, he said, is many parents rely solely on the results of blood or skin tests, which are increasing in use because of easier access. Blood tests measure IgE antibodies, chemicals present during an allergic reaction. Skin tests involve measuring hives that result from pricking the skin with food extract.

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Of course, this is not really anything new, but it is good that at least one hospital is helping families get to the bottom of things.

[Brickbat]

1. I went through a strange period of getting hives and losing blood pressure and having my tongue

swell up a few years ago. I got tested for allergies and while nothing was a huge hit, I was told I was moderately allergic to egg whites. I've been avoiding egg whites since then and haven't had a problem. On the other hand, I (unknowingly) had a hamburger bun with an egg white in it last summer and had no problems with it.

I think allergies are so poorly understood it's hard to know what the right thing to do is. I wouldn't be surprised if my egg allergy gives me a reaction only when I combine it with something else I might have a sensitivity to and get a cross-reaction. Like, if I eat egg whites AND it's a bad birch-pollen day AND I combine it with alcohol, maybe THAT's what gives me a bad reaction. It's so hard to nail it down.

[frazzled]

2. It is indeed hard to pin it down

Sometimes, it's just a virus that has attacked your immune system and manifests itself as a skin eruption like hives. That is what the emergency room physicians guessed when my son, many years ago, developed an incredible case of hives that caused his joints to swell and his kidney to practically shut down. The pediatrician wasn't so sure: he felt certain it might be an allergy. I believed it was the result of an unusually windy few days that spring wafting the ubiquitous lawn chemicals in our neighborhood (except for our proudly weedy, chemical-free lawn) all over the place. We never figured it out. But it never happened again, so why worry about it?

My sister recently developed a horrendous case of hives that happened to coincide with having eaten out at a Thai restaurant (shrimp, peanuts?). It was severe and has lasted several weeks, but allergy tests showed nothing. The doctor felt it was viral in nature.

I have had two bad, persistent food reactions during my life. A severe reaction to peanuts suddenly developed when I was in my twenties--well before the time the idea of a peanut allergy was known or popular. I didn't have to go to an allergist: the cause was completely clear. And I had to be super vigilant about things cooked in peanut oil, etc. I've avoided peanuts for more than 30 years now, but it's very possible that this sensitivity, after years of avoidance of the culprit, has vanished over the years, as mysteriously as it came. My other reaction came from bell peppers, something I'd eaten my whole life, and it got increasingly worse. Who knows if it would happen again if I ate one? I don't want to know. And I don't want to see an allergist.