How to identify food allergies?
If you think you have a food allergy, there are several key ways to identify the foods that cause problems in particular. Follow these steps to identify your potential food allergies.
Keep a food diary
1 If you are not sure that certain foods seem to cause problems for you, keep a food diary for two weeks or more. Having a record of foods and symptoms can help you combine foods or ingredients with specific individual reactions. Once you have an idea of some foods that can cause discomfort, you can try elimination diets or allergy tests formal office of a health care provider.
2 Write down everything you eat and drink. It is essential to have a complete record of everything you eat during the week of your food diary.
Continue to eat your normal diet, but carry a small notebook with you register snacks, vending machine purchases, and other drinks or bite to eat you can have all day.
Include all ingredients. For example, if you eat an oatmeal cookie, write down all the ingredients and save the list of ingredients if the cookie is store bought. This will help you identify potential allergens, as you should be able to distinguish between OAT and an egg allergy knowing exactly what you eat everything contained and performing removal and subsequent reintroduction.
3 Carefully note the timing, type and severity of reactions. In some cases, food intolerance may be confused with actual allergic reactions and temporary reactions may point to the wrong foods offenders.
Note the details of symptoms such as itching, swelling, hives, stomach pain, diarrhea, nausea, cramps, fever, and all other reactions of the skin or gastrointestinal tract. This will help you identify the type of sensitivity you have and management techniques that will be most suitable for your food intolerance or allergy.
4 Discuss your results with a dietician or health care provider. Once you have a detailed food diary, you can chat with a potential offending nutrition specialist or an allergist to identify certain foods to avoid or strategies to reduce food reactions.
Perform an elimination diet or Challenge Test
1 Once you have gathered complete information about your diet and symptoms and discussing with a professional health or nutrition, consider doing an elimination diet or provocation test to identify certain allergies Food. If you experience anaphylaxis all foods at all, do not attempt to perform an elimination diet or oral challenge without the supervision of a physician. If your reactions are usually mild or trivial, however, an elimination diet or oral challenge may help to narrow the list of possibilities.
2 Select a list of foods to eliminate. After carefully considering your food diary for foods that seem to be related to symptoms, make a list of foods to eliminate from your diet, although temporarily.
Unless you suspect an allergy to a highly invasive ingredient, such as gluten or lactose, avoid severely limit your daily diet by selecting up to five individual foods to eliminate both.
3 Start the elimination diet strictly by avoiding foods chosen entirely for 1-4 weeks. Continue recording your diet and symptoms during this time. If symptoms have diminished or disappeared, add a weekly food back into your diet and continue to monitor the reactions.
If reintroduced food causes no reaction for the whole week, scratching your list of potential allergens and introduce the next food the following week. Continue until you have identified or particular foods that cause reactions, prevent and stop the challenge of the week if your symptoms return.
Be careful when removing food. For example, if you think that honey is the allergen, check the labels for biscuits, sauces, cereals, nuts, flavored bottled teas. If you eat a lot of pre-packaged or prepared products, always check the ingredients labels to see if the food you might not suspect could possibly contain potential allergens.
4 Keep track of all the foods that cause reactions on the reintroduction. Make a list of foods that caused the symptoms and keep the food out of your daily diet until you can discuss the responses with a health care professional or a test of the specific allergen.
If you have had a reaction to a food with more than one ingredient, write down all the ingredients in the food product, including additives, preservatives, colorings, and nutritional supplements. Although applesauce, mustard, or soda may seem to be the allergen, the offender could really be a spice, food coloring, or a sugar substitute.
5 Repeat the process if necessary until reactions disappear. If you continue to have symptoms, but reduces the severity or frequency, it is possible that you have identified the majority of allergens in your diet or you missed the hidden allergens that are found in processed foods.
If you need help refine your elimination diet, consult a nutritionist or allergist for advice. In some cases, he or she may be able to review your list of suspect foods and your food diary to identify potential areas for experimentation.
For example, a nutritionist may be able to look at your notes and identify the offending food groups or types (such as fruit seeds or emulsifiers in sauces), cross-contamination (often with nuts or seeds), or incomplete removal (due to hidden the offending ingredient names published sources or more ingredients on food labels).
6 Perform a test oral challenge. If you experience swelling, hives, or symptom of anaphylactic reaction after eating certain foods, do not test for oral challenge without the direct supervision of a doctor or allergy specialist.
Provocation test is to orally consume a small but growing single allergenic potential portions, thereby increasing the time between doses to detect reactions. If no reaction is known, a greater amount is consumed.
Only a specific food is tested in both the oral provocation tests to avoid confusion with other potential allergens. Do not make more of a challenge test orally per week, except under the supervision of a healthcare professional.
Get tested for food allergies
1 Look for a test if you are still unsure and for security reasons. In many cases, it can be difficult to identify food allergies. If you have already completed a year of food diary and an elimination diet or oral challenge, a health professional should be able to identify potential allergens by skin tests or blood tests. In cases of benign or variable reactions to foods, several types of methods for detecting food allergies are needed to confirm a particular allergy. Examining the combination of information obtained from food diaries, elimination and attempted oral provocation tests and skin allergies or blood usually allows to identify specific food allergies.
2 Ask a skin test. In most cases, skin tests can be performed quickly and safely in the office of your primary care provider or that of an allergy specialist.
Skin tests involve developing a grid on your skin and inserting small amounts of potential offenders under the surface of the skin. Any place on the grid which shows a reaction can indicate a specific food allergy or sensitivity.
3 Request an allergy test in the blood. Blood tests for allergies are able to identify much more than food allergy skin tests, and can sometimes provide information that best represents the true allergies (skin tests can indicate a skin allergy to contact food).
An allergy blood test requires a small blood sample to be sent to a laboratory for analysis. It may take several weeks to get results, which often includes a printout of all foods tested and the specific results for each food.
Keep a food diary
1 If you are not sure that certain foods seem to cause problems for you, keep a food diary for two weeks or more. Having a record of foods and symptoms can help you combine foods or ingredients with specific individual reactions. Once you have an idea of some foods that can cause discomfort, you can try elimination diets or allergy tests formal office of a health care provider.
2 Write down everything you eat and drink. It is essential to have a complete record of everything you eat during the week of your food diary.
Continue to eat your normal diet, but carry a small notebook with you register snacks, vending machine purchases, and other drinks or bite to eat you can have all day.
Include all ingredients. For example, if you eat an oatmeal cookie, write down all the ingredients and save the list of ingredients if the cookie is store bought. This will help you identify potential allergens, as you should be able to distinguish between OAT and an egg allergy knowing exactly what you eat everything contained and performing removal and subsequent reintroduction.
3 Carefully note the timing, type and severity of reactions. In some cases, food intolerance may be confused with actual allergic reactions and temporary reactions may point to the wrong foods offenders.
Note the details of symptoms such as itching, swelling, hives, stomach pain, diarrhea, nausea, cramps, fever, and all other reactions of the skin or gastrointestinal tract. This will help you identify the type of sensitivity you have and management techniques that will be most suitable for your food intolerance or allergy.
4 Discuss your results with a dietician or health care provider. Once you have a detailed food diary, you can chat with a potential offending nutrition specialist or an allergist to identify certain foods to avoid or strategies to reduce food reactions.
Perform an elimination diet or Challenge Test
1 Once you have gathered complete information about your diet and symptoms and discussing with a professional health or nutrition, consider doing an elimination diet or provocation test to identify certain allergies Food. If you experience anaphylaxis all foods at all, do not attempt to perform an elimination diet or oral challenge without the supervision of a physician. If your reactions are usually mild or trivial, however, an elimination diet or oral challenge may help to narrow the list of possibilities.
2 Select a list of foods to eliminate. After carefully considering your food diary for foods that seem to be related to symptoms, make a list of foods to eliminate from your diet, although temporarily.
Unless you suspect an allergy to a highly invasive ingredient, such as gluten or lactose, avoid severely limit your daily diet by selecting up to five individual foods to eliminate both.
3 Start the elimination diet strictly by avoiding foods chosen entirely for 1-4 weeks. Continue recording your diet and symptoms during this time. If symptoms have diminished or disappeared, add a weekly food back into your diet and continue to monitor the reactions.
If reintroduced food causes no reaction for the whole week, scratching your list of potential allergens and introduce the next food the following week. Continue until you have identified or particular foods that cause reactions, prevent and stop the challenge of the week if your symptoms return.
Be careful when removing food. For example, if you think that honey is the allergen, check the labels for biscuits, sauces, cereals, nuts, flavored bottled teas. If you eat a lot of pre-packaged or prepared products, always check the ingredients labels to see if the food you might not suspect could possibly contain potential allergens.
4 Keep track of all the foods that cause reactions on the reintroduction. Make a list of foods that caused the symptoms and keep the food out of your daily diet until you can discuss the responses with a health care professional or a test of the specific allergen.
If you have had a reaction to a food with more than one ingredient, write down all the ingredients in the food product, including additives, preservatives, colorings, and nutritional supplements. Although applesauce, mustard, or soda may seem to be the allergen, the offender could really be a spice, food coloring, or a sugar substitute.
5 Repeat the process if necessary until reactions disappear. If you continue to have symptoms, but reduces the severity or frequency, it is possible that you have identified the majority of allergens in your diet or you missed the hidden allergens that are found in processed foods.
If you need help refine your elimination diet, consult a nutritionist or allergist for advice. In some cases, he or she may be able to review your list of suspect foods and your food diary to identify potential areas for experimentation.
For example, a nutritionist may be able to look at your notes and identify the offending food groups or types (such as fruit seeds or emulsifiers in sauces), cross-contamination (often with nuts or seeds), or incomplete removal (due to hidden the offending ingredient names published sources or more ingredients on food labels).
6 Perform a test oral challenge. If you experience swelling, hives, or symptom of anaphylactic reaction after eating certain foods, do not test for oral challenge without the direct supervision of a doctor or allergy specialist.
Provocation test is to orally consume a small but growing single allergenic potential portions, thereby increasing the time between doses to detect reactions. If no reaction is known, a greater amount is consumed.
Only a specific food is tested in both the oral provocation tests to avoid confusion with other potential allergens. Do not make more of a challenge test orally per week, except under the supervision of a healthcare professional.
Get tested for food allergies
1 Look for a test if you are still unsure and for security reasons. In many cases, it can be difficult to identify food allergies. If you have already completed a year of food diary and an elimination diet or oral challenge, a health professional should be able to identify potential allergens by skin tests or blood tests. In cases of benign or variable reactions to foods, several types of methods for detecting food allergies are needed to confirm a particular allergy. Examining the combination of information obtained from food diaries, elimination and attempted oral provocation tests and skin allergies or blood usually allows to identify specific food allergies.
2 Ask a skin test. In most cases, skin tests can be performed quickly and safely in the office of your primary care provider or that of an allergy specialist.
Skin tests involve developing a grid on your skin and inserting small amounts of potential offenders under the surface of the skin. Any place on the grid which shows a reaction can indicate a specific food allergy or sensitivity.
3 Request an allergy test in the blood. Blood tests for allergies are able to identify much more than food allergy skin tests, and can sometimes provide information that best represents the true allergies (skin tests can indicate a skin allergy to contact food).
An allergy blood test requires a small blood sample to be sent to a laboratory for analysis. It may take several weeks to get results, which often includes a printout of all foods tested and the specific results for each food.
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