Author Archives: AllergyAsthma

Food Allergy – Symptoms & Treatment

Food allergies are some of the common type of allergies and if precautions are not taken then it can lead to severe consequences. Many people with food allergies suffer from severe reactions. One such reaction is anaphylaxis which is life threatening.

Food allergy is caused by a substance called an “allergen”. People with a food allergy have an immune system which reacts to certain proteins found in food. Their immune system attacks the specific protein which is a harmful pathogen, such as a bacterium or virus.

Food allergy mostly affects the children. There is high percentage of children suffering from food allergies than the adults because their immune systems are not fully developed.

Signs and symptoms of Food Allergy

The signs and symptoms of food allergies are tingling in the mouth, severe rashes, swelling on lips and face, streaming eyes, diarrhea and serious breathing problems. It can also cause rapid fall in blood pressure, abrupt fear, nausea etc.

Why certain people have allergic reactions?

Family history: people who have parent or sibling with a peanut allergy have a 7 times more risk of having food allergy themselves, compared to those with no family history.

Food allergy prevalence is higher in those countries which are far from the equator due to which there is low sunlight and sunlight is a big source of vitamin-D. The suggestion is that low vitamin-D intake may result in higher risk of food allergy.

Tests and diagnosis

It is important for the patient to always tell the symptoms, when the reaction started occurring, what food they had and where, whether the food was properly cooked or not and the most important the family background if anybody in the family was suffering from this food allergy.

If the person tells all these symptoms to the doctor then it will make it easy for the doctor to diagnose the problem. Doctors first recommend skin tests which is called skin prick test. This skin prick testing can sometimes produce false-negative or false-positive results. To make sure doctors also recommend other tests also.

Doctors also recommend having blood test because in blood the tiny particles of food will tell the allergic reaction.

Treatment options

Elimination diet: Patients need to see a dietician or you may also consult a Food Allergy Doctor, after being diagnosed with food allergy. It is important for them to eliminate those foods from their diet which causes food allergy.

If the problem have arises from the family background then they should specially avoid eating that food. While eating you need to be little careful.

Child Safety – Food Safety! Keeping Food Allergies Away

It’s difficult to keep kids away from food. But for those kids who have food allergies, you have to be cautious. Usually holidays, party time and family get together create chances for allergens to escape the safety net. And it might not be a pleasant time if the kid accidently catches the allergen. So, the first basic thing that you should do is make sure that you identify food stuff that the kid should stay away from.

Highlighting Danger

You would want to make sure that your kid identifies food stuff that is not good for him. If you are cooking in house then you can obviously avoid using allergens. But if you are going out, then make sure that food stuff that might or does contain allergen is identified. But still, it might be a good idea to make sure that anti-allergens are close by.

Wipe Hands

Just using hand sanitizer is not enough. You need to make sure that hands are wiped with wipes, clean towels before and after handling food. Sanitizers do kill germs, but they don’t essential remove food proteins. So you would need to make sure that your child washes hands before and after handling food. Make this their usual habit. Washing is just not enough, wiping hands with wipes or clean towels is equally essential.

Clean before preparing

If you are preparing food, then make sure that all the food preparation area are cleaned and wiped properly. Don’t use an old cloth or wipe or sponge to clean counters, try to use paper towels and commercial cleaners. Also, take into account that the utensils are wiped properly after washing.

Food Preparation

If your menu includes safe food and unsafe food, then make sure that while preparing to cook and cooking, you distinguish first safe from unsafe. Keep safe ingredients separate from unsafe ingredients. Cook the safe dishes first and keep them away properly wrapped and covered. Then start preparing unsafe food.

Serving Food

If you or any other adult is serving food to your child, then make sure that the kids plate is prepared first. Even if it is for adult, if the menu contains both safe and unsafe food, then care should be taken while serving and using cutlery to serve.

Consult a food allergy clinic to get advice on safety measures that you can take or medicines that you should keep handy in case of allergy incident.

Breaking the Cycle – Breathing Exercises to assist Asthma Treatment

People suffering from asthma often fall into that vicious circle of avoiding more and more use of their muscles. The fear of falling short of breath, and asthma attacks makes people under utilize the muscles, which causes them to stress even under slight exertion. In this article we are going to discuss some exercises that you can follow to maintain healthy muscle movement. If the muscles have adequate strength, then these exercises could aid in your asthma treatment.

Nose Breathing

Our nostrils have various other functions then just help us take in air. The hair inside the nose act as natural filter, they block small particles that might be present in the air. At the same time, the air that we breathe is warmed and humidified by the nostrils. The most common situation is to breathe through the mouth during an attack because you’re gasping for air. Try to make it a point to breathe as much as you can through your nose. If you have any illness of the nose, then try to get that rectified too.

Lip Breathing

All you need to do is breath through the nose and breathe out through your mouth. But before you blow out, you need to shape your lips in a way that you are blowing candles. The second thing to keep in mind is that if you are taking 3 seconds to breathe in, then you should take about 6 minutes to breathe out. So you are not releasing air all together, you release it slowly. This will clear the nasal passage. Once you do it regularly, you will notice then whenever your muscles are exerting, you will start breathing this way.

Belly Breathing

Notice, when you breathe, two parts of your body show distinctive movement. But that is only noticed when you are lying relaxed. These two parts are your abdomen and your chest. When you are lying down, you will notice that the abdomen and chest move out while breathing in and move in while breathing out. In asthma cases, the diaphragm in the abdomen doesn’t work much. Diaphragm is the main muscle that helps lungs push out air. When it doesn’t work, other parts of the body kick in, but then they are not as effective. So through belly breathing, we train our diaphragm to work optimally. All you need to do is keep one hand on chest and one on abdomen, and while breathing out, apply gentle pressure on the abdomen.

It is advised though that you consult an asthma doctor before attempting to do any of these exercises.

Like Gardening? Have Allergies? Tips for you to Enjoy Gardening

If you suffer from any kind of allergy, then there are chances that you can’t enjoy gardening quite as much. The pollen grains, the dust, the insects, the wind, the plant type or just the smell of certain kind, anything can cause allergy. It might be a good idea to visit an allergy clinic to discuss allergens. Apart from professional medical help, here are a few tips that you can follow.

Preventive Allergy Tips

Be sure to take medicines prescribed by an allergy doctor. These medicines can prevent the allergen to cause any effect.
There is preventive gardening gear that you can purchase from the market. Gloves and mask that can prevent pollen grains from getting in contact with the body. You can also wear glasses to keep your eyes protected.
Make sure that you are gardening when there is slight breeze and not a strong wind. It would be better to stay indoors during windy days.
Check weather forecast for pollen grain count. Select the days for gardening when the pollen grain count is less. Make sure that you employ a system which can irrigate your garden without you being their personally.
After gardening, make sure that you wash your clothes and take a bath. Keep your gardening clothes separate and make sure that you take wash yourself well.

Tips for selecting plants

Go for colorful plants. These plants are usually insect pollinated and have larger pollen grains. As compared to trees and other wind pollinated plant, these plants lesser number of pollens. So planting colorful plants would reduce the chances of getting allergies.

If you plan to include trees in your garden or yard, here is a choice of trees that would be good for you if you are allergic. You can select from crape myrtle, fig, dogwood, pear, palm, redbud, plum and redwood. These trees are less likely to see cause allergies.

Then there are some female plants that don’t produce pollens, so you can even go for a selection of those. Here are the varieties to select from box elder, cottonwood, poplar, maple and willow.

Hope these tips are helpful in keeping you busy with gardening. Make sure that if you are still getting effected with allergies than you consult an allergist. It is always wise to take professional help.

Diagnosis and Treatments of Sinusitis or Sinus diseases

If you the doctor believes that you are suffering from sinus disease, then he can follow any of the following procedure to confirm and treat.

Endoscopy

Endoscopy is basically a thin tube with lights and cameras used to insert inside the body to detect problems that are not easily visible. To diagnose and confirm sinusitis, doctors may perform nasal endoscopy. Through an endoscopy, doctors try to see the drainage passage. They would evaluate the passage for areas of blockage, polyps and structure.

To perform the nasal endoscopy, the doctor may numb the nasal cavity. Then a rigid or flexible endoscope will be inserted to examine then nasal passage. Depending on the report, the doctor would administer treatment.

Treatments for Sinus Disease

Acute Sinusitis

This is considered as the starting stage, so the doctor may just give some nasal drops and give medicines that could be taken through steam. If the condition is not that serious, then they might just ask you to take some steam. Some nasal drops are even available over the counter, but you have to be careful with them, never take them more than the prescribed or suggested times.

Chronic Sinusitis

Depending on the condition and severity, the doctor may prescribe antibiotic, nasal drops and recommend steam. Warm air soothes nasal passages and gives relief from nose pain. So the doctor would give you medicines that could be taken through steam. Other than that, doctors also prescribe nasal drops which could help with pain and help in opening nasal passages.

Other Treatments

Precaution is definitely the best cure, so if you are suffering from sinus disease for the first time, then the doctor would determine the reason for the disease. They would then advise to take precautions so that it doesn’t occur frequently. If you are suffering from recurring sinusitis, then the doctor would also use endoscopy to determine the reason for it. Precautionary measures might be taken be suggested or treatment done by the doctor to cure recurring sinus disease.

In cases where the problem is severe and antibiotics are not working, then the doctor could also prescribe steroid sprays that would reduce inflammation. If the sinus is supposed to be caused by bacteria, or during inflammation if the doctor finds traces of bacteria, then antibiotics will also be prescribed. Based on the reason of sinusitis, doctors may prescribe antihistamines or anti fungal drugs. So it is necessary that you consult a sinus disease doctor for proper treatment.

Are you suffering from Sinuses Disease?

Before we start discussing about sinuses disease, you need to understand what is sinuses. It is a cavity within a bone of the face or skull connecting with the nasal cavity. When the tissue lining that cavity swell, the condition is called sinusitis. Usually, the cavity will be filled with air, but during sinusitis, it could get filled with fluid or germs and can lead to infection. Some people usually get sinusitis problem during winters, the conditions that cause this problem are:

Common cold
Allergic Rhinitis
Nasal Polyps
Deviated septum

What are the different Types of Sinusitis?

Acute

This type of sinusitis would usually occur after during cold. If cold or any similar symptom lasts for more than 10 to 14 days then it might lead to acute sinusitis. Acute sinusitis usually lasts for about 4 weeks. With proper medication and doctor’s advice, the problem could be solved before that period.

Subacute

If the sinusitis lasts for more than 4 weeks, then it would be considered as a subacute sinusitis. Sinusitis should not be taken lightly, and if suffering from subacute sinusitis, then it is definitely time to consult a doctor if not done already.

Chornic

If the problem elongates for more than 8 weeks, then it is considered as Chronic sinusitis. Usually, people suffer from chronic sinusitis during winters, as that’s usually the time to be suffering from cold that can extend over a long period.

Recurrent

This could be because of hereditary problems or because of some other allergy or infection. If sinusitis occurs regularly during a year, then it is considered to be recurrent sinusitis. During recurring sinusitis, doctors would usually prescribe precautions and medications or inhalations that can be used to get relief.

Can You be Affected with Sinusitis?

We have already mentioned general conditions that can lead to sinusitis. So if you suffer from any of those, then there are good chances that it can lead to sinusitis. People usually don’t take common cold seriously, and seldom don’t consult doctors. That could be a big factor to lead to sinusitis.

If the inner membrane of the nose swells as a result of common cold, then it could lead to sinus.
If the nasal ducts gets blocked
If the immune system becomes weak leading to increased chances of germ infection.

In general, if due to common cold your nasal passage gets blocked, then there are increased chances of getting affected with sinusitis.

Symptoms of Sinus Disease

Sinus disease is also known as sinus infection or sinusitis. It causes swelling and inflammation of air cavities inside the nose. Some patients also experience facial pain and nasal trauma.

Sinus diseases are caused by microorganisms like fungus, bacteria and viruses. Often these microorganisms grow inside sinus. Chemicals and other external elements like allergens can also cause sinus infection. There are different categories of sinus infection like acute & sub-acute sinus infection, chronic sinus infection and infectious and non- infectious sinusitis. This classification is based on the causes and severity of the infection. Also, different sinus infection impacts different parts of the body like nose and head.

In most cases, this is not a contagious disease. However, in some cases physical contact might transmit the infection from one person to another.

Symptoms and diagnosis of sinus disease

Some symptoms of sinus disease are listed below:

Fever
Swelling of face
Cough and sore throat
Inflammation in nasal cavities
Dizziness and fatigue
Coloured liquid coming out from the nose
Pain in teeth
Bad breath

Diagnosis of sinus disease is done by examining nose, throat and sinuses. Generally if there is swelling in the nasal tissues accompanied by discharge, it is considered to be a sinus infection. Skin is also examined for any sign of redness. For examining inside area of the nose, a tiny camera is inserted in it. However, this process is not as painful as it sounds. A nasal spray is given so that camera tube can slide inside the nose comfortably.

If the disease persists for more than eight weeks, than a CT scan of sinus is done for diagnosing the problem.

Treatment of sinus disease

Sinus disease treatment is done by giving antibiotics, sprays for decongesting nasal and antihistamines etc. Depending on the symptoms, single or multiple drugs can be given. In some extreme cases of sinus disease surgery is also required. These are minor surgeries that are done to open up the closed passage.

If you notice any persisting symptom of this disease, immediately go to your nearest sinus disease clinical centre. Delay in treatment will only result is more pain. Since, in some cases it can be infectious, so make sure that your negligence should not cause problem to other people around you. Another thing is that with time the disease might become more severe, which in turn will increase the cost of the treatment.

Symptoms of Drug Allergy

In simple terms, any adverse reaction due to medicine can be termed as drug allergy. Body can react to any foreign substance, but in these cases drugs are solely responsible for causing allergic reactions. When immune system reacts to these drugs, symptoms of allergies may appear. Remember, drug allergies are different from drug overdose.

Drug Allergy Symptoms

Symptoms of drug allergy depend on the severity of the problem. In some cases, allergy can affect more than one organ. Some common symptoms are:

Fever
Skin rash and itching
Increase in heartbeat and pulse rate
Breathing becomes difficult
Anxiety
Swelling of lips and tongues
In severe cases some people might suffer from loss of consciousness
Vomiting and pain in abdominal area

Diagnosis and Treatment of Drug Allergies

Diagnosing drug allergy

Some drugs responsible for allergies are penicillin, insulin, other antibiotics, anticonvulsants and iodine etc. Drug allergy is diagnosed by doing skin test or by stopping any particular drug. If by stopping the drug use symptoms also stops than it means that particular drug is responsible for causing allergic reactions.

Treating drug allergies

For treatment, doctor in drug allergy clinic will stop giving you the allergy inducing medicine. Instead they will give you antihistamines for controlling itching and hives. Some allergies can cause Asthma. In case of allergic Asthma, albuterol is given for reducing symptoms like chest tightness, fever and shortness of breath. Some medication is also given through injections.

For anyone suffering from drug allergy, it is very important that before starting any treatment, he or she should inform the doctor about his medical condition. They will give you alternative antibiotics. Desensitization is done by giving small amount of antibiotics in the initial stage of treatment. Gradually the quantity is increased so that immune system can deal with it without having any adverse reaction. Overdose of allergy causing drugs can be lethal.

Allergies can be potentially life threatening. If you have any symptom, go to the nearest drug allergy clinical center immediately. For someone with more than one allergy, he or she should stop exposing themselves to that antibiotic or any other allergy causing substance. Call the doctor or emergency services before things get out of control.

Symptoms of Food Allergy

Adverse reaction by our immune system caused due to consumption of a particular food item can be called food allergy. Sometimes allergy can be hereditary.

Symptoms and diagnosis of food allergy

Like any other allergy, food allergy is also quite subjective. It will vary from person to person and from substance to substance. For people who are allergic to a particular substance, even a small amount could react.

Some common symptoms of food allergies are:

Rashes and hives
Nausea
Short breath
Coughing
Vomiting
Pain in abdominal area
Swelling of face
Itching of skin

In extreme cases food allergy can cause fainting and even death. Anaphylaxis is a severe form of allergy which causes problems in blood circulation and respiratory tract. Some common food items that can cause allergic reactions are egg, milk, seafood, fruits and vegetables etc.

Diagnosing food allergies

The food item that causes adverse reaction every time you eat it is the main culprit. Though age is no bar for 1`getting allergies, children are more susceptible to food allergies. Cross reactivity can also happen, this means a person allergic to a particular food item, for example egg, will also give allergic reactions when he or she consumes any other food made up of egg. Two types of test are conducted by food allergy clinics:

Blood test: Amount of IgE antibody is measure for particular food item. Results are not as accurate as skin test.

Skin test: Food allergen is injected in the skin. If the skin reacts to the allergen than it means the test is positive.

Treatment of food allergy

First thing that one can do is avoid that particular food item. Allergy can also be caused by touching, so avoid coming in contact with that allergen. Symptoms of allergy can be controlled by giving antihistamine. Giving antihistamine is not a cure but it provides relief to the patient by calming down histamine. It can be given in three forms – gels or lotions, sprays and capsules. Steroids can also be given to settle down the agitated immune system. But before you try any of these yourself, do consult allergy clinic to know the administration and the appropriate form. Because these all are chemicals, it is necessary that you only take one which suits you and doesn’t cause any other chain reaction.

Whenever symptoms of food allergy are discovered, immediately go to your nearby food allergy clinical center. They will diagnose the root cause of the problem and start treatment. These clinical centres will also help you in managing the allergy.

Ocular Allergies Troubling You – Some Tips to Manage them

Any allergen that causes some kind of disturbance to your eyes could possibly indicate ocular allergies. The most common symptom of ocular allergy is burning sensation, redness, itching and swelling. If your eyes get swelled up during a particular season or if they suddenly become red, then that could point towards scheduling a time with an allergist. This one of the reasons why doctors always advise to wash hands properly before touching eyes and to use only clean cloth to wipe the eye off. Sometimes ocular allergy could also result from splashing dirty water on the eyes. The worst part is the irritation that allergies to the eye could cause. It is not at all a pleasant situation. Here are some tips that should help you avoid or take control of the allergy, though before trying any of these, it is always better to consult an allergy specialist.

Precautions & Management

The first thing to note is whenever you go out, wear sunglasses. And don’t by any shoddy pair; make sure that you are purchasing UV protection sunglasses that can keep your eyes safe. Whenever you are touching your eyes, wash your hands with at least water and then use a clean cloth gently. If you suffer from ocular allergies or have had some symptoms earlier, then visit a doctor who can advise or detect the allergen. Then try to take extra precautions for that allergen. Quite often when we are in a strong emotional state, we are careless with the eyes; that should be avoided at all costs. Wearing reading glasses or sunglasses could help in that to quite an extent.

Medication

There are certain over the counter drugs that can be used to alleviate the irritation during eye allergy. But it is still advised not to use them blindly! You should always consult an allergist to help you identify the best medicine that would suite your eye. Wrong medication could further damage the eye. Some of the commonly administered medications are:

Artificial tears
Antihistamine drops, that help during itching
Swelling control drops
Decongestant drops

Most of the eye related medicines would be in the form of drops. Precaution should be taken while administering these drops. You have to make sure that you hold your eye lids with clean hands and then you use clean cloth to wipe the tears. Do consult your allergist about the medication that would be best suited for you.