Allergen test: how to determine the cause of an allergy

A cat, house dust, mold, fun­gus, or maybe your favorite per­fume — it is almost impos­si­ble to inde­pen­dent­ly deter­mine the cause of an aller­gic reac­tion. An aller­gen can be iden­ti­fied with the help of spe­cial med­ical tests. They will help you take pre­ven­tive mea­sures in time or start the right treat­ment.

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Who Should Get an Allergy Test?

There are sev­er­al indi­ca­tions for aller­gen test­ing. First of all, these are the symp­toms of an aller­gic reac­tion after con­tact with cer­tain sub­stances, or eat­ing cer­tain foods. It is rec­om­mend­ed to do aller­gy tests for der­mati­tis, con­junc­tivi­tis or chron­ic bron­chi­tis. Peo­ple who con­stant­ly come into con­tact with harm­ful chem­i­cals that cause cough­ing, short­ness of breath, con­junc­tivi­tis and oth­er signs of aller­gies are also at risk. It is worth con­tact­ing an aller­gist and those who have a hered­i­tary pre­dis­po­si­tion to aller­gies.

Read also: How to pre­vent aller­gies: 5 tips for aller­gy suf­fer­ers

What are the types of allergy tests?

Skin tests. This is the sim­plest and most com­mon aller­gy test. It is car­ried out in the fol­low­ing way: the alleged aller­gen is applied to cer­tain areas of the skin (as a rule, this is the fore­arm or back). Then the doc­tor observes the reac­tion of the body. If it is pos­i­tive, after about 30 min­utes, red­ness appears on the skin, some­times with blis­ters.

intra­der­mal tests. This study helps to get more accu­rate results. To find out the body’s reac­tion to a par­tic­u­lar aller­gen, its solu­tion is inject­ed into the sur­face of the skin. As a result, a bub­ble is formed (up to about 4 mm in size). The first reac­tion appears after 20 min­utes, the full result becomes appar­ent with­in a day.

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provoca­tive tests. Helps diag­nose aller­gy to inhalant aller­gens. A solu­tion of the sus­pect­ed aller­gen is sprayed into the nasal cav­i­ty and the reac­tion is observed. It is impor­tant to know that such a study can be car­ried out exclu­sive­ly in a hos­pi­tal, in no case should you do it your­self.

Blood test for spe­cif­ic immunoglob­u­lins E. Aller­gy to house­hold, pollen, food and oth­er aller­gens is accom­pa­nied by the appear­ance of class E anti­bod­ies (immunoglob­u­lins — Ig) in the blood. In patients with aller­gic dis­eases, the lev­el of spe­cif­ic IgE anti­bod­ies is sharply increased.

Read also: Pollen Aller­gy: Flow­er­ing Cal­en­dar and Treat­ments

How to alleviate the condition with allergies?

If the study con­firmed your aller­gy sta­tus, do not despair and pan­ic.

First, now you know the cause of the aller­gy. This is already a vic­to­ry, because now you can avoid con­tact with the “ene­my”.

Sec­ond­ly, prop­er­ly select­ed ther­a­py and time­ly pre­ven­tive mea­sures will help min­i­mize the man­i­fes­ta­tions of aller­gies and con­tin­ue to lead a full-fledged lifestyle.

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You should start tak­ing the drug at the first man­i­fes­ta­tions of an aller­gic rhini­tis, and con­tin­ue until the symp­toms are com­plete­ly relieved or until the end of the aller­gy sea­son.

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