Get Tested for Food Allergies

Food allergies can be minor or they can be a major health risk — even deadly. They can cause hives, constipation, diarrhea, bloating, anaphylaxis (closing of throat), or rash. When testing for food allergies, it is important you do not try to diagnose it on your own. Often this approach will result in excluding necessary nutrients from your diet. Worse yet, a misdiagnosis might cause you to leave a serious condition untreated. When visiting a doctor, you should take necessary precautions to communicate all relevant information. You should also verify that the approach suggested by the doctor is scientifically sound.

Steps

Preparing to Visit a Doctor

1. Find a credentialed doctor. It can be tempting to imagine that you have isolated the cause of your allergy on your own and don’t need professional assistance. What appears like an allergy can actually be part of a larger disorder. Flawed self-diagnoses can cause these issues to go untreated and result in unnecessarily limiting your access to appropriate sources of nutrition.
   • It is also important that the doctor you seek has proper medical training. Some experimental methods of testing allergies are actually suspected of increasing the risk of acquiring an allergy.
2. Call in advance to request a food allergy test. If your healthcare provider offers the service, you can schedule an appointment specifically to get tested for food allergies.
   • In some cases, offices may require a consultation prior to testing to ensure that your insurance will cover the test. If you have no medical reason for suspecting a food allergy (medical reasons would include gastrointestinal discomfort or hives after eating certain foods), your doctor may wish to discuss the appropriateness of the test or try food elimination prior to subjecting you to a skin food allergy test.
3. Ask whether the test will be provided at your practitioner’s office. In some cases, you may be sent off-site to a laboratory or referred to an allergy specialist for a food allergy test. If this is the case, ask whether you first need to be seen at your healthcare provider’s office or if you can simply go directly to the test center or specialist office.
4. Ask your healthcare provider if you need to prepare for the allergy test. Some physicians may request that you practice an elimination diet or keep a food diary. These can be necessary for isolating an allergy and determining what tests are required. Do not pursue these methods, however, without the explicit recommendation of a doctor.
5. Write down all relevant information. Before you visit the doctor, you should be sure that you have available all the information that will allow them to diagnosis your allergy. This includes your symptoms and everything that might have influenced your condition. Writing this down will make it less likely that you forget important information.
   • Write down all of the symptoms you had. This includes symptoms that maybe came later and seemed unrelated. They could be part of the same disorder and might be important for diagnosing your condition. Write down when the reaction occurred, how long the reaction lasted, the severity of the symptoms, and any treatment provided and your reaction to that treatment.
   • Write down what you ate, how it was prepared (raw, cooked, powdered, etc.), how much you ate, and when you ate it.
   • Also write down all of the medications that you were on. Major life changes and outside stressors can also cause negative physical effects, so be sure to inform your doctor of these as well.
   • If you can, consider bringing along a family member or friend. They might remember things that you forgot.
6. Ask your doctor if an elimination diet is necessary. Some people will break out into hives immediately after eating something they are allergic to. Sometimes, however, allergic reactions are delayed. If it is unclear what caused the allergic reaction, your doctor may want you to eliminate suspicious foods from your diet. It is important you discuss this with your doctor first as they can help you ensure you still get all your required nutrients.
   • Think back to what you ate on the day of your outbreak. Eliminate those foods from your diet for two weeks.
   • Slowly introduce the suspected foods into your diet, one at a time. Write down everything you eat and any symptoms you experience. Remember, the effects may not be immediate — it may be a few days before you experience a reaction.
   • If you experience a return of symptoms when you reintroduce a suspected food, then it is likely you are allergic to that food.
   • If the allergy was severe, you should not attempt this. Each time our body comes into contact with an allergen, the response gets stronger and stronger. If you already had a severe reaction to the allergen, even a minor encounter could prove fatal. Talk to your doctor about identifying the trigger as soon as possible, as well as preventative measures and what to do should you be exposed to the allergen.

Undergoing Professional Testing

1. Know what to avoid. The only approved methods of testing allergies are the skin prick test, the blood test, and the oral food challenge. Other methods of testing can lead to false results and might even be dangerous. Some unapproved methods include:
   • Applied Kinesiology, Cytotoxicity testing vega testing, NAET, IG64 Testing, Hair Analysis, and Pulse Testing.
2. Get a skin prick test. This is perhaps the most common food allergy test. A grid is drawn on your skin and tiny amounts of potential food allergens are inserted under the surface of the skin. Squares on the grid that develop a red bump or swelling may indicate a food allergy.
   • This test does not necessarily confirm food allergies on its own. A negative reaction is usually 90% accurate, while a positive reaction is less than 50% accurate. More testing might be necessary.
3. Ask your healthcare provider about a blood test. This requires sending a sample of your blood to a laboratory to get it tested against an extensive list of potential food allergens. The test measures the level of antibodies against specific foods.
   • This test will often be used to confirm the results of a skin prick test; however, these tests can also be subject to some error and thus it might be necessary to undergo additional testing to confirm the results.
4. Perform an oral challenge under the supervision of a health professional. When particular foods are suspected to cause an allergy or intolerance, some physicians or health professionals may have you introduce incrementally larger portions of the food into your mouth to test your reaction. The portions will be measured, beginning with very small amounts that are unlikely to cause a response.
   • If you have a reaction to one of the foods, the test will be stopped.
   • Because the amounts of food are small and carefully administered, reactions will generally be mild, such as flushing or hives. Severe reactions are uncommon.
   • This can be used to determine if the blood test gave you a false positive.
   • If you have no reaction to the suspected allergens, then you can work with your doctor to figure out what is causing your symptoms. If you do have a reaction, you will need to discuss the next steps with your doctor.
   • Because there is the chance this test may cause a serious reaction, it must be done by an experienced professional in a medical setting. This way, the necessary medications and equipment will be available if you have a severe reaction.
5. Discuss preventative measures with your doctor. If a food allergy is confirmed, it is essential that you work with your doctor to create a management plan. It will be necessary to eliminate the food from your diet and take precautions to educate the people in your life about your allergy and train them what to do if you have a reaction.
   • Educate your family, friends, and workplace or school about your allergy. This may include teaching them to read food labels properly, as well as any alternate names for the allergen. For instance, if you have a peanut allergy, you will need to check labels for ingredients that contain peanut protein, such as arachis oil, goober peas, nutmeat, mandelonas, hypogaeic acid, and more.
   • You may need to avoid situations in which there is a high risk of accidental cross-contamination or ingestion of the allergen, such as buffets and picnics.
   • Wear medical identification jewelry that indicates your food allergy.
   • Carry an emergency epinephrine pen with you at all times in case you come into accidental contact with the allergen (for instance, at a restaurant in which cross-contamination occurs). Make sure your family, friends, co-workers, and teachers know how to use it.
   • Consider creating a written emergency management plan to carry with you at all times and distribute to work, school, friends, and family. This will inform others of the recomended treatment should you have a reaction and includes emergency contact information. You can download a form here: http://www.foodallergy.org/faap.

Warnings

• Do not attempt an oral challenge test or elimination diet without the guidance of a health professional. In cases of severe allergies, even introductions of minute quantities of the offending food can cause death, as can nut allergies with young children. As such, an emergency epinephrine pen should always be carried to prevent fatal consequences.

Related Articles

• Pinpoint Food Allergies
• Recognize Food Allergies
• Survive Thanksgiving with Food Allergies
• Avoid Food Allergies when Eating at Restaurants
• Use an Epipen
• Recognize Anaphylaxis

Sources and Citations

See also

• Treat Farmer's Lung
• Administer Vaccines
• Give the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) Vaccine
• Diagnose Farmer's Lung
• Live With an Allergy to Aspirin
• Reduce Your Exposure to Pollen
• Recognize Peanut Allergies
• Know When to Take Antihistamines
• Get Your Nose to Stop Running With Allergies
• Fight Hay Fever

Read more ...

What links here

• Recognize Peanut Allergies
• Recognize Anaphylaxis