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Allergy
Testing
Get To Know
Allergy Testing Methods To Help You Diagnosing Your Asthma
Allergy testing
should be performed when you are
suspected to have an allergy that induce your asthma but the allergen
still uncovered. Even if you already know what induces your asthma, your
doctor will conduct allergy testing to confirm the
asthma
diagnosis.
But why must you get definite answer of
your allergy?
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Allergy treatment might cost you a lot
of time and money, you therefore should know exactly the cause of
your allergy.
-
Allergy test can also help you to
determine whether your problem is caused by allergy or just
intolerance.
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If you have allergy that is related to
your working place, you might need a solid proof when your case has
a law implication.
How To Choose The Most Suitable Allergy Testing For You
To choose an allergy testing, you should
collect these information :
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Detailed
aspects of your allergy reaction
Your age
Which part of
your body that has been attacked?
What might have
caused it?
How bad is the
reaction?
Does the
allergy test meet these standards? |
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Relevant (including the allergens
possibilities)
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Meet a standard (result from one place
could be connected to result from other places)
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Repeatable (all tests performed in
different times must have equal results)
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Specific (test result is positive only
for someone with allergy)
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Sensitive (no false results)
Skin Prick Test
The most common allergy testing is
skin prick test. This test is a safe, localized and sensitive way to
stimulate your reaction using allergen to check your reaction to certain
allergen (usually
food allergen).
However skin prick test will be less sensitive during the use of
antihistamine, corticosteroid and anti depressant. In these cases, the
doctor will ask you to come back for the test after 3-5 days. Skin prick
test is also less sensitive for children and people at golden ages.
How Is Skin Prick Test Performed?
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Skin prick test is done on the lower
forearm (on the back for children).
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The tested area will be cleaned with
alcohol.
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Then a drop of allergen extract will
be placed on the marked area in 2 spots.
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Using a sterilized tool called lancet,
a small prick will be made right on the allergen drop spot. The
allergen drop will enter you skin through the prick.
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After 20 minutes, the doctor will
measure your reactions.
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The whole process will be repeated for
every allergen tested.
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The positive result could be seen
after a small lump, that is itchy with redness around it, appears.
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To confirm the skin prick test
validity, the doctor will do two controls, using saline solution
(salt-water) for negative control, and histamine solution for
positive control. If the saline solution test is negative and
histamine solution is positive, then the skin prick test you just
performed is valid. Otherwise, the test is invalid, might be because
of some medication you are having, or your skin is too sensitive.
Advantages of Skin Prick Test
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The process does not hurt, so that
children can perform this test.
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The positive reaction is itchy skin,
which will disappear within less than one hour.
-
Skin prick test is a simple, quick and
inexpensive test.
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Up to 20 allergens could be tested at
the same time.
Other skin test doctors may suggest
for you are scratch test
(scratching skin and putting some allergen on the substrate of the
scratch), and intradermal
test (injecting some
allergen behind the top layer of your skin).
Patch Test
Another allergy testing performed on
skin is patch test, which is usually conducted for
allergic contact dermatitis
cases with allergy suspect. Patch test is quite simple and safe, however
on a severe allergy case, itchy and swollen might be the side effect of
this test.
How Is Patch Test Performed?
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Patch test is performed on the your
back. The skin area where the test would be performed should be
clean and free from any skin problems.
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An allergen concentration is blended
with white soft paraffin (to ease the absorbing process by the
skin).
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The solution will be placed on a small
metal cup, and attached to a tape.
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Then the tape will be applied on your
back for 48 hours.
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After the doctors removed the tape
from your skin, they will check whether your skin become red,
swelling, or blistering as the reaction to the allergen.
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After another 48 hours there will be
another check to your skin.
More About Patch Test...
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Interpretation of patch test is not
easy, and need special knowledge on the allergen and your allergy
history.
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However, if done thoroughly, patch
test could provide useful information to diagnose allergic contact
dermatitis.
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Patch test has a side effect of
triggering a memory response to your immune system against the
allergen. For example you conducted a patch test after you have had
an allergic symptoms from wearing latex gloves on your hands. When
the metal cups are applied on your back, your immune system will
recognize the allergen (even if they are on 2 different areas of
your skin – hands and back!), and will trigger a worse allergy
symptoms than before.
Blood Test
Blood test would be your choice when
you have
eczema,
as having skin prick test for this allergy will be uncomfortable. Or
when you have severe allergy reaction, that allergen exposure in skin
prick test would be too risky. There are two methods to do allergy
testing with blood test:
RAST (radioallergosorbent test)
The RAST will measure the presence of IgE antibody level in your
blood to a specific allergens. IgE level varies on different ages.
Babies have a very low IgE level, which will slowly increase until its
reach the age of 30s. After 40s, the IgE level tend to decrease. The
high level IgE level in your blood will indicate that your asthma might
be induced by some allergen.
However, RAST have some disadvantages :
RAST cannot detect the specific allergen that induce asthma, and cannot
confirm whether the asthma symptoms you are having is really induced by
allergen.
Eosinophil Count Test
Eosinophil count is a blood
test
that measures the number of white blood cells called
eosinophils.
There is around 4 eosinophils in every 100 white blood cells. In asthma
cases, the number will be higher.
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