Food Allergies and Chronic Illness
Different types of food allergy.
The immediate or IgE mediated food allergy pattern is easily
recognized because it involves quick and dramatic symptoms. It is also easily recognized
be standard medical blood testing for allergies, or the skin scratch test.
Delayed patterns of food allergy or IgG mediated food allergies
are not so obvious and often go unrecognized. The ‘standard medical allergy
skin tests do not show this problem nor do IgE antibody tests. Also, because the reactions are very subtle
and delayed for hours, or a day or more, they are very difficult to recognize.
The common specific problems that are obviously related to food
allergy include asthma, rhinitis, otitis media, atopic dermatitis, urticaria,
anaphylaxis, angioedema, celiac disease, dermatitis Herpetiformis, allergic
gastroenteropathy, allergic arthritis and diabetes-especially type 1.
Many of the major unsolved disease of our civilization are either
degenerative and/or inflammatory and many are recognized to be immune-mediated
or hypersensitivity diseases. The delayed patterns of food allergy can be the
cause of chronic and disabling hypersensitivity disease. The stakes are high
both for individual patients and for the society as a whole. None of the common
hypersensitivity diseases have been solved and most appear to rage on,
afflicting increasing numbers of patients with chronic and disabling diseases.
Asthma, allergy, rheumatic diseases, autoimmune diseases,
multiple sclerosis, diabetes, thyroiditis, psoriasis and diabetes are examples
of hypersensitivity diseases that involve humoral and cell-mediated immunity.
We use celiac disease - wheat allergy- as a prototype that demonstrates the
prolific ability of food allergy to produce a wide range of diseases.
We think food allergy is a disease mechanism triggered common
proteins in the diet. The main offending foods are staples such as cows’ milk,
eggs, wheat, soy, corn and meat. Food allergy is commonly recognized in infants
and young children. In older children and adults, food allergy is seldom
recognized, although up to 25% of adults report some adverse reactions from
eating specific foods.
Commonly quoted “expert” opinions tend to minimize the incidence
and importance of food allergy. While the dogma is misleading, it represents
vested interests and is remarkably persistent. The type 1 model of allergy is
attractive to physicians and researchers, because of its relative simplicity
and the ease of testing for sensitization; but it selects only a special
population of people with IgE-mediated allergy.
While this is an important reaction pattern, some physicians
have claimed it is the only valid form of allergic reactions to food. Their
opinion is not acceptable. A distinction between immediate, obvious allergic
reactions and delayed, less obvious, chronic immune injury is useful.
The problem is not that 25% of people recognize symptoms from
food ingestion, but that many more people do not recognize that food is making
them ill. We hope the reader will take the time to find out why we think food
allergy is such an important mechanism of disease and how to resolve common
food-related health problems by diet revision.
Antibody Test Helps Patients
Overcome Symptoms Of Delayed Allergy; Practitioner Achieves Successful Clinical
Outcomes With Igg Test
Grasp a red-hot pot handle,
and you feel a searing pain in your hand. Nick your finger on a sharp kitchen
knife, and blood seeps out almost instantly. In injuries like these, the cause
is simple to ascertain, because the effect immediately follows in its tracks.
But imagine if the pain or
wound didn’t show up until days after the event that caused it? Without
seeing a clear, visible sequence, you might be hard-pressed to figure why your
symptoms suddenly surfaced from “nowhere.”
A similar challenge faces
people who suffer from delayed allergic reactions to food. These patients may
experience fatigue, headaches, digestive problems, mood shifts, skin rashes, and
other symptoms hours, or even days, after consuming an offending substance.
By measuring levels of
immunoglobulin G (IgG) in the blood of these patients, however, and
implementing dietary changes to avoid foods triggering a high IgG response,
more than 70% of these symptoms may be successfully reduced or eliminated,
according to a recently published clinical study by Hamilton S. Dixon, M.D. The
study was originally presented at the Annual Meeting of the
Dr. Dixon began the study by
first identifying 114 patients who showed chronic symptoms of delayed food
allergy based on their personal histories. This group included patients with
inhalant allergy symptoms who did not improve after two months of immunotherapy
based on previous allergy tests. “Delayed food allergy is highly suspect in
allergic patients with negative IgE RAST or skin test results,” Dr. Dixon
pointed out.
All the patients were tested
for IgG levels and advised to follow a diet that partially or completely
eliminated foods triggering strong responses. Of the eighty patients who
complied with the dietary changes for six to twenty-two months after the test,
more than 70% reported a dramatic clinical improvement of at least 75% for
their symptoms.
“Of special interest were 20
patients with disabling symptoms,” observed Dr. Dixon. These patients “achieved
an 80% or greater improvement level, with 20% of those achieving 100%
improvement and 50% obtaining 90% or more relief.” Further follow-up on the
compliant patients has been “borne out with excellent outcomes,” Dr. Dixon
added.
Dr. Dixon advises IgG food
testing “when chronic food allergy symptoms are present and conservative
treatment has failed.” The test, he notes, offers several clinical advantages
over food challenge tests for delayed symptoms, which are cumbersome and
impractical, and over scratch or prick tests for foods, which are often
unreliable (approximately 20% accuracy rate).
Besides treating chronic
symptoms in adults, IgG testing also has great clinical potential for treating
children with secretory otitis, who often require repeated tube insertions,
suggests Dr. Dixon. Changing a child’s diet based on IgG response is likely to
be much more economical than many other treatments for secretory otitis, which
currently incurs total healthcare costs of over $2 billion a year.
NOTE: The Comprehensive
Antibody Assessment measures both IgE and IgG responses to 88
general or 92 vegetarian foods, to pinpoint immune reactions that could be
triggering immediate and delayed reactions to specific foods. An IgE Inhalant
panel that is customized to reflect five different regions in the country is
included as well.
As Dr. Dixon emphasizes,
effective diet manipulation following IgG test results is the key to achieving
successful clinical outcomes. For this reason, every Antibody Assessment report
comes with a patient-friendly True Relief™ Rotation Diet Schedule, designed to
reflect each patient’s unique antibody responses.
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