Food Allergies
Q: I have had various medical problems for quite some time, and they seem to be getting worse. I have had headaches several days a week, unrelated to tension, and at various times of the day, often just after meals. I have had a dry, itchy rash on my arms, legs and abdomen. My nose seems to be congested most of the time, but I don’t have a cold. I also have arthritis which gives me frequent pains in the wrists, elbows and knees. I’ve taken pain medications, skin creams, decongestants and anti-inflammatory drugs, but they only give temporary relief, at best. What is going on and what else should I do?
A: Many of us have medical problems which, at first glance, do not seem to have a cause or connecting thread. Fortunately, it’s been found that we can often explain these “mysterious” complaints by discovering sensitivities to foods. By treating food allergies you may find that your symptoms disappear, never again to return. Perhaps the best part is that such an approach may help you avoid using medications which can cause a whole range of problems on their own. (See chart at end of this section.)
Surprisingly, every major organ system can be affected by reactions to foods. The chart below indicates some of the more common types of reactions.
Unfortunately, it is the foods we eat most frequently that are the most likely to cause a reaction. Although any food can be liable, the most common offenders are milk, wheat, eggs, corn, citrus, peanuts, sugar, chocolate, yeast, and food additives. In children, rice is also a common problem.
Interestingly enough, you may be eating a food every day and not realize that it is causing difficulties. This is because there are different phases of the food reaction cycle. There may be some foods which cause you to have an immediate reaction, such as a rash, wheezing, or a headache. It’s easy to identify those foods and to simply avoid them. In many cases, however, the food reaction may take a few hours to a few days to develop; so you may eat a food on Monday and not have a headache until Wednesday, for example.
With foods you eat frequently, you may often develop an adaptation to the allergic reactions. Then you may experience a chronic state of subdued reaction which continues from day to day, and not even realize the food is causing problems. If you avoid the offending foods, you may experience a “withdrawal” reaction which is even worse than the original symptom. These withdrawal symptoms go away when you eat the food once more, so it is not unusual to develop a craving for the very foods to which you are most sensitive.
Diagnosis
You may be wondering at this point how we go about deciding which foods are causing problems. The process is certainly complicated by the large number of foods we normally eat. But there are several effective methods we can use.
The simplest approach is to write down everything you eat and how you are feeling each day. By looking for a pattern you may be able to determine a relationship between foods and symptoms.
However, this first step may not be successful because of the adaptive nature of some of your food allergies, or because of delayed reactions. In that case, an elimination diet might be helpful. In this method, you avoid all suspected foods for a week, sometimes longer. For more difficult cases, we can provide you with a purified nutritional formula to use as a temporary food replacement (UltraClear and UltraCare for Kids). If your symptoms have cleared, you then reintroduce each of the suspected foods one at a time, in excess. Having avoided the foods for a prolonged period, they should now bring about a readily observable reaction if they are the type that are causing an immediate type of reaction.
One problem with the elimination method is that it is very hard to do well. We are very much creatures of habit when it comes to diet. It is almost impossible for many people to completely turn their diets upside down, and avoid those foods which they eat most frequently.
Another big drawback is that we might not have chosen to eliminate all of the right foods. If that is the case, even though we have eliminated some of them, your symptoms would continue and the whole method would fail. In the case of delayed reactions, it might be hard to determine which reintroduced foods are causing reactions.
Nevertheless, with all of its disadvantages, the elimination trial is helpful for some people. But it is not surprising that there has been a lot of research over the last few years to discover a better method for determining food allergies. Just such a method is “IgE” and “IgG RAST” testing. This laboratory test has quickly become a powerful tool in diagnosing food allergies.
RAST testing allows us to measure the levels of different antibodies which are circulating in the bloodstream. Antibodies are special substances that react to specific foods or other allergies. The IgE type of antibody accounts for thirty to forty percent of food sensitivity reactions. IgE reactions are the ones associated with immediate symptoms (generally within two hours or so). IgG reactions, however, account for the delayed reactions (from two hours to three days), which comprise fifty to sixty percent of food sensitivities. There is another ten per cent or so which we cannot generally trace to antibodies. Intestinal reactions, in particular, often fall into this category.
RAST testing is easy to do because only a small vial of serum is needed to test fifty different foods at one time. IgE testing has been around for several years, but IgG testing, which is probably more important, has only recently become available, in a few laboratories. RAST testing can also be done for environmental sensitivities, such as pollens, dust, and molds. A new finding is that delayed (IgG) sensitivities to molds may also be important causes of a variety of chronic symptoms.
Another useful method for diagnosis is skin testing. This is more time-consuming and uncomfortable than RAST testing, but it has a special advantage. The results of intradermal testing can be used to develop an effective treatment for each specific food sensitivity which is discovered. So a RAST test may be used for diagnosis and intradermal testing to begin therapy. Sometimes, skin testing will also pick up sensitivities which have not been determined by other methods.
Treatment
This brings us to the whole question of how to treat your food allergies once you have decided which foods are the culprits.
The most effective method, although often the most difficult, is avoidance. If you can avoid the offending food completely, it will usually stop causing problems after a few days. After a variable period of time (often as short as three to six months), you may be able to start reintroducing the food slowly and see if it still causes problems. It’s important not to overdo it at this point, because an allergy might again reappear. Moderation is the key.
It’s also important to pay attention to biological families. For example, if you are allergic to tomatoes, it’s quite likely that you are also sensitive to potatoes, peppers and eggplants (this is the “nightshade” family). These closely related foods often cause cross-reactions. With a large number of food sensitivities, the process can become quite complicated; however, a trained practitioner can help you substitute alternative foods for those which are commonly eaten. Another important function of the practitioner would be to make sure that your new diet is still nutritionally adequate.
Because of the difficulty of complete avoidance, however, it may be desirable to pursue a rotary diversified diet in cases where there are multiple food allergies. In this method, you make sure you eat different foods on particular days and then wait a few days before eating those foods again. Usually a four-day rotation is effective in relieving symptoms. Eventually, you may also “grow out of” your food sensitivities, and return to a normal diet.
But there is a way to speed this process along, and even eat allergenic foods more frequently without ill effects. This is possible through neutralization therapy. This is based on a neutralizing dose which has been determined by intradermal testing. A specific neutralizing dose for each food can usually be given in the form of drops under the tongue (“sublingually”). This is based on a well-known principle; medicines which need to get directly into the bloodstream are often given sublingually because there is a group of veins under the tongue which can absorb them readily. The neutralizing dose contains a tiny amount of the food, -- just enough to bind up the circulating antibodies and prevent them from causing symptoms.
Sublingual therapy can also be used for other types of allergies, such as those to tree, grass and wheat pollens, dust, molds, cats, and dogs. In addition to helping you feel better, it may also give the immune system a rest from a constant cycle of reaction and recovery. This will hasten the day when the allergy problem is really cured for good.
| VARIOUS FOOD ALLERGIES 1. Skin. Itching, burning, flushing, warmth, coldness, tingling, sweating behind neck, etc. Hives, blisters, blotches, red spots, “pimples.” 2. Ear, nose, throat: Nasal congestion, sneezing, nasal itching, runny nose, postnasal drip. Sore, dry, or tickling throat, clearing throat, itching palate, hoarseness, hacking cough. Fullness, ringing, or popping of ears, earache, intermittent deafness, dizziness, imbalance. 3. Eye: Blurring of vision, pain in eyes, watery eyes, crossing of eyes, glare hurts eyes, eyelids twitching, itching, drooping, or swollen; redness and swelling of inner angle of lower lid. 4. Respiratory: Shortness of breath, wheeze, cough, mucus formation in bronchial tubes. 5. Cardiovascular: Pounding heart, increased pulse rate, skipped beats, flushing, pallor, warm, cold, tingling, redness or blueness of hands, faintness, pericardial pain. 6. Gastrointestinal: Dryness of mouth, increased salivation, canker sores, stinging tongue, toothache, burping, retasting, heartburn, indigestion, nausea, vomiting, difficulty in swallowing, rumbling in abdomen, abdominal pain, cramps, diarrhea, itching or burning of rectum. 7. Genitourinary: Frequent, urgent, or painful urination; inability to control bladder; vaginal itching or discharge. 8. Muscular Fatigue, generalized muscular weakness, muscle and joint pain, stiffness, soreness, chest pain, backache, neck muscle spasm, generalized spasticity. 9. Nervous system: Headache, migraine, compulsively sleepy, drowsy, groggy, slow, sluggish, dull, depressed, serious, crying, tense, anxious, stimulated, overactive, restless, jittery, convulsive, head feels full or enlarged, floating, silly, giggling, laughing, inebriated, unable to concentrate, feeling of separateness or apartness from others, amnesia for words or numbers or names, stammering or stuttering speech. SOURCE: Miller, J. B. Food Allergy. Springfield: Charles C. Thomas, Publisher, 1972, p. 21. |
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