Allergy
September 15, 2009
Allergy, sensitivity and intolerance are applied interchangeably to depict any negative reaction happening from vulnerability to an otherwise harmless substance. It impacts the lives of a great number of people every year and it growing rapidly in today’s generation.
An allergic reaction happens because of a severe over sensitivity to the dietary ingredients that are found in any offending foods, from chemicals, flowers, grasses, and environmental products. Some unexpected things you probably have in your home right now might also be causes of allergies and cause allergy symptoms to flare up. Sufficient treatment usually starts with avoiding the substances that triggers any unwanted symptoms that any bearer has.
There are, however, no methods of curing allergies and therefore the best measure that can be taken is to create an environment where the occurrence of the allergens is greatly reduced. The severity of the allergy also has a bearing on what measures must be taken to ensure that there are no allergens present in a given environment.
For example, if the allergen is contained in food then especially stringent measures must be taken to ensure that none is mixed with other food, since the worst type of allergy reactions tend to be when somebody swallows something that contains the allergen.
The worst allergic reaction is when a person goes into anaphylactic shock, which can lead to death if not treated in time. Even if the allergy is not as severe as that, there is still the everyday discomfort that will lower the quality of life for anyone who has to live with this.
The type and severity of the allergy will be the determining steps when deciding what steps need to be taken to ensure that person suffering from the allergy is kept out of harms way. The simplest step is to avoid the source of the allergens, but in some cases this may well be impossible.
One of the most common allergies is stated as being allergic to “dust”, this is however a misconception. There are very few people who are actually allergic to dust, but there are a very large portion of people who are allergic to dust mites and their excretions. These dust mites are commonly found in household dust, pet dander and feathers.
There are very few people that can create an environment that is completely free of these allergens without going to massive expense. There are however products available that can decrease the amount of these allergens in the immediate environment, particularly in the bed room.
Treatments for allergies include allergen avoidance, use of anti-histamines, steroids or other oral medications, immunotherapy to desensitize the response to allergen, and targeted therapy. Treatments to salvage allergy symptoms ranging from over-the-counter antihistamine medications to allergy shots, are available nowdays.
There are a lot of hidden sources for allergies. For a thorough list of hidden sources, ask your allergist or other healthcare professional. This is not meant as medical advice, but intended to help those with food sensitivities (and certain allergies) to provide ideas for substitutions.
