For anyone who suffers from allergies whether food allergies or hay fever or other it would seem that allergy testing is an important way forward. We are used to our health professionals doing scans with X rays and ultrasound and all hospitals and some clinics offer laboratory testing.

But allergy testing is not as straightforward as other tests and that’s why we’ll go over it here. Allergy testing is complicated and somewhat controversial, so I’ll do my best to show you all the issues.

Firstly there are many different types of allergy test. It’s not just that Food allergiers have to be tested differently to contact or airborne allergies but there are different technologies too.

For food allergies the simplest test is the Elimination Diet. I say, “simplest” but it can be hard to interpret the results. An Elimination Diet is a very simple diet that excludes a lot of common foods to which you might be allergic.

Following a diet that does not include possible allergens or foods to which you are sensitive or allergic may be difficult in itself and unless carefully designed, such a diet may not provide all the nutrients you need for good health.

For example, it has been found that many patients with allergies are deficient of the mineral magnesium. Green leafy vegetable are a good source of magnesium and if your Elimination Diet plan leaves such foods out your allergies may get worse.

At the end of test period of, for example, 2 weeks a small portion of a suspected food allergen can be taken. If there are no symptoms within an agreed time period you can assume you are not allergic to that food.

One problem with this method is that some food allergies take 24 hours or longer to appear because not all allergies give immediate reactions. Even so, when done carefully with the supervision of a healthcare professional this Elimination Diet method can be useful. It does, of course take a lot of cooperation from the allergy patient.

The “Prick and Scratch test” works much faster! A few drops of a test liquid containing a small amount of the allergen are put onto the skin of your forearm.

A small scratch or sometimes a prick with a needle is made sp that the liquid can get into the top layer of the skin. If the skin flares up and shows an allergic reaction such as a red itchy swelling then it is assumed that the patient is allergic to that substance.

This must be done under close medical supervision because there is a chance of a severe reaction!
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Patch testing has been used for testing possible contact allergies. Small amounts of possible allergens are placed under small patches which are taped to the skin for a few hours. If the skin under the patch then the patient is sensitive and perhaps allergic to that substance. Best used to test soap powder, cosmetics or industrial chemicals.

Blood Tests For Allergies

There are several competing blood tests we could look at here. We’ll look at what is the most established and credible in my view – the RAST test.

If we take the view that allergies are reactions from the immune system then we can measure allergic reactions by measuring the immune system. The immune system is very complex so we look at one part of it namely antibodies in the blood.

Simply put there should not be antibodies in the blood simply because you have eaten something and if there are we have a sign that you have an allergy to that food.

That is the simple view. In fact there are several types of antibodies and there are differences of view amongst the experts about which antibodies to measure!

That being said the RAST test and of course there are various versions of that as well, is well known and has the advantage of being totally safe because the testing is done on a small blood sample and not requiring the patient to eat or be otherwise exposed to the possible allergen.

The whole subject of allergy is controversial, experts contradict each other you’ll need someone reliable and professionally trained to help navigate through this complex topic.

If you want to read further

Allergy Proof Recipes for Kids: More Than 150 Recipes That are All Wheat-Free, Gluten-Free, Nut-Free, Egg-Free and Low in Sugar

or

Food Allergies For Dummies

Happy reading and do leave a comment with your experience of Allergy Testing and how much it helped you.