Much food allergy testing is available from physician’s offices. Allergies are quite common, especially milk allergies and gluten allergies. But allergies to other common foods may cause health problems also. Choosing the correct food allergy test is important or you may run the risk of having worthless information that will have no effect on your health.
Food allergy testing can be an important tool in the identification of foods that are affecting immune system function. If you have a chronic health condition that has immune system involvement, without identifying the foods you are allergic to through food allergy tests that are causing this immune system involvement, you will probably not get well.
If you suffer from Crohn’s Disease, any form of Colitis, Hashimoto’s Disease, Graves Disease, Multiple Sclerosis, Lupus, Rhuematoid Arthritis or any autoimmune inflammatory condition, a food allergy test is key to your recovery.
But, which food allergy test? There is much controversy surrounding food allergy testing. Traditional physicians have relied on skin prick tests, but they are well known to have too many false positives and false negatives. That means they will suggest allergic responses to foods you are not allergic to and not identify foods that you are allergic to.
The most success I have had with food allergy testing is to test for 88 separate foods through a blood sample looking for IgG responses using an ELISA protocol. Okay, a bunch of big words you probably don’t understand. Here’s what’s important to know:
- An IgG response is a delayed reaction and IgE response is an immediate reaction. I only have interest in the delayed reactions as they are what cause the chronic symptoms that no one seems to be able to correlate with any particular food. The reason is because you may eat something on Tuesday for lunch and not react to it till Thursday after dinner. How in the world could you ever tie the two events together? IgE or immediate reactions are easy to identify. This explains why you are truly unable to identify ALL the foods that are causing your symptoms.
- An ELISA protocol is different from a RAST protocol. It’s a difference in lab analysis and if you test using RAST, you are wasting your time.
The food allergy test I recommend is done by Genova Diagnostics in Asheville, North Carolina. It is a food allergy test I have used since 1997. The reason is that the results always have an impact on the health of the patient. Following these results and eliminating the foods you have been found allergic to is imperative in order to get well.
Call Dr. Dahlman’s office for details about how to accomplish this test and to arrange for a food allergy test for you. Cost of the test is $ 325.
