Everyone seems to be an expert on allergies diagnosis when you show symptoms of being hypersensitive to a particular allergen. Sneeze and everyone around you will tell you that it is hay fever, break out in rashes and you will be told that it is a reaction to poison ivy or simply hyperventilate and advice on asthma will pour in from all sides.
Actually these symptoms are often strong indicators of your suffering from allergies. However, no correct diagnosis can be made unless you consult a doctor who gives you one of the many allergies diagnosis tests.
Questions To Ask
Even before prescribing these tests, your physician will ask you a battery of questions. These questions will help him or her narrow down the search for the particular allergen that affects you. Some of these questions are:
Do your parents or siblings suffer from allergy? What is the nature of these allergies?
Is there a particular time of the year when you exhibit these symptoms?
Do you have pets at home? Does being around them make your symptoms worse?
What are the foodstuffs that you eat regularly?
Do your symptoms become worse after eating something?
Does doing something give you relief from these symptoms?
Have you ever tried any anti-allergy medicine?
Are you on medication?
Skin Tests
One of the most common kind of tests prescribed for allergies diagnosis are skin tests. There are three kinds of skin tests:
Patch Test: This is a method to determine the offending agent in contact dermatitis. A number of possible allergens are kept on the skin and covered with patches. If you are allergic to one of them, the skin under that particular patch will show signs of irritation.
Prick Method: This is the most popular among the skin tests. A tiny drop of the allergy causing substance is put on your back. A needle is then passed through the substance and into the skin, pricking it. If the particular substance is the one you are hypersensitive to, your skin will show signs of irritation.
Intradermal Test: This is a very similar to the Prick Method. However, in this one, the suspected allergen is injected directly into the top layer of the skin, usually of the upper arm.
Blood Tests
A common blood test used in allergies diagnosis is the Radioallergosorbent Test or RAST, though it is not as popular as the skin tests.
In some cases, like eczema and other severe skin allergies, it is not possible to perform skin tests. Instead, the RAST becomes the only resort.
The blood test is also a useful tool to determine whether you have outgrown a particular food allergy.
Blood tests are also used to determine the severity of the allergy by measuring the amount of the antibody Immunoglobulin E (IgE) in the body. A CBC (complete blood count) profile also helps understand allergies.
Elimination Tests
This test, in which you would be asked to eliminate one thing from your diet at a time, is sometimes used to determine food allergies.
Spirometry
This is a test used in the diagnosis of asthma. This test measures the lung function after using a drug which dilates the bronchial cavity. This test can be performed on anyone above 5 years of age.
Double Blind Food Challenge
This is a test which is rarely used and is effective only with food allergies that are not very severe. You will be asked to swallow certain capsules. These capsules will contain certain food stuffs. Neither you nor your doctor will know beforehand what these capsules contain.
As we have seen there are quite a few options that a healthcare professional can choose for allergy diagnosis. However judgement and common sense needs to be used to decide which test suits you best.