As a result of artificially processed food, wide access to exotic fruits and vegetables, global environmental pollution, more and more adults suffer from food allergies. Even if they have never struggled with any other allergy before.
How to recognize a food allergy?
Food allergy can occur at any age, so far it has most often manifested itself in infants and small children, but more and more often it affects adults who have not previously suffered from hay fever, bronchial asthma or rashes, i.e. not experiencing allergies in childhood. Food allergy occurs then when the immune reaction of the human body incorrectly reacts to the food eaten and causes the occurrence of various clinical symptoms. The allergenic food is then treated by the body as an “intruder” that must be quickly destroyed. In adults, allergies are mainly caused by products of plant origin (wheat flour, nuts, soybeans, lentils). Symptoms can vary and affect different organs.
The most common: – atopic dermatitis, nettles, edema; – runny nose, laryngeal edema, bronchial asthma, recurrent pneumonia; – vomiting, diarrhea, lip swelling and itching, esophagitis, colitis.
In extreme cases, there may be a sudden decrease in arterial blood pressure, circulatory disorders (palpitations), bronchospasm, i.e. to the so-called. anaphylactic shockwhich can even lead to death. The body’s immune system usually reacts very quickly to an “unwanted” food allergen, which is why the first symptoms appear almost immediately after eating this allergen. It should be remembered that the symptoms always occur after eating the same food and cause the same ailments. Usually it is a whole range of symptoms at once. Hives may appear on the skin, it starts to get stuffy and the lips swell, and esophageal reflux occurs. It should be noted that abdominal pain and diarrhea are missing from these symptoms. Food allergy is usually associated with intestinal and stomach problems, but they do not have to occur. When we notice that we feel bad after eating food, we should immediately discontinue the product. You should not experiment and try again the product after which we have observed an adverse allergic reaction, then the already mentioned anaphylactic shock may occur. There is also an obvious difficulty related to which specific product made us allergic. Contact with an allergist should resolve this problem, although diagnostics in this case is quite complicated and difficult due to the lack of a single diagnostic method that would indicate the right allergen.
Therefore, the following should be performed: • tests with a dozen or so of the most common allergenic food allergens, regardless of the type of symptoms; • determination of specific IgE in blood serum – their detection is indisputable proof of the existence of allergy; • food provocation tests – consist in administering gradually increasing amounts of food allergen – up to the onset of clinical symptoms; • detailed history regarding symptoms, type and ailments, inheritance characteristics, eating habits also in childhood.
Treatment
Most commonly used elimination dietwhich consists in the temporary elimination of one or several groups of products suspected of causing food allergy. When the elimination diet does not bring the desired results, pharmacological treatment begins desensitizationDesensitization, in this case, causes the immune system of the digestive tract to stop responding to allergens, or react less.