I’ve been having some problems with allergies over the past 6-8 months, mainly in the form of random swelling. Mostly, it occurs in my hands and feet, but a few times, my lip and places on my arms reacted as well.
The first time this happened was around 3-4 years ago, when I woke up in the middle of the night with a swollen right hand. I drove myself to the emergency room and was told that it was an allergic reaction to “something”. After taking some Benadryl, I was better in about 12 hours. I didn’t have any problems with swelling again until about 2 years later, and then it happened every 1-2 months. In the summer of last year, it started getting more frequent, and when the swelling hit my mouth, I decided it was time to see a doctor.
The doctor prescribed Zyrtec, which cleared everything up, but, not wanting me to rely on Zyrtec forever, he referred me to an allergist. Today was the first of 2 appointments for scratch testing. I had to be off the Zyrtec for 7 days prior to the test. A few days after stopping the Zyrtec, the swelling came back. The nurse told me that I would not be able to take the test if that were the case, so last night, the Dr. prescribed Prednisone to get rid of the swelling. By morning, the swelling had pretty much disappeared, so I was good to go.
If you haven’t gone through the scratch test before, here’s what happens (there are different versions of the test, so this isn’t always the way it goes, but most tests are similar):
The nurse carried in a compartmentalized tray filled with little cylinders. Each cylinder was dipped in a different possible allergen. The tip of the cylinder contained a hollow needle/pin with a sharp edge.
First, the nurse cleaned my left arm with an alcohol swab then pushed one of the cylinders into my arm above the elbow and turned it, scratching the skin and administering a generic histamine. She explained that if this area didn’t react, it would be a sign that there were anti-histamines in my body and they couldn’t continue with the test (in other words, this was to make sure I hadn’t cheated and taken allergy medication). She then set a kitchen timer for 15 minutes, then left me alone to occupy my time. Within about 5 minutes, I had a wheal (a raised spot on the skin) on my arm about the size of a pencil eraser right where I was scratched. After the 15 minutes were up, another nurse (for clarity’s sake, I’ll call her the Judge) took a look at the wheal on my arm and rated it a ’4′. It itched like crazy, but it was a good sign that the tests should produce results.
The nurse then drew a grid on my left forearm with a ballpoint pen, marking off the spaces where the allergens would be applied. She then scratched my left forearm with 34 separate allergens — this particular test was for environmental allergins (dust, mold, pollen, etc.). After another 15 minutes passed, the Judge returned. This time, she put on some latex gloves, and proceeded to rub a finger over each of the scratch spots, calling out numbers — “3, 2, 2, 3, negative, negative 3, 2 . . .” — rating the height of each wheal.
Here’s what the left arm looked like after I got home:
One of the scratches was just a saline solution. They used this scratch as a control, or baseline. If the saline solution produced a wheal, that wheal’s rating would be subtracted from the other ratings. The saline wheal was negative, so the ratings of the other wheals weren’t altered.
Next, the nurse repeated the same procedure on my right arm. This series of tests was for food allergies. It was a smaller test, and only required 20 scratches, including the saline. After 15 minutes, the Judge returned and began rating the scratches. Turns out my right arm is was a little more sensitive to being scratched than my left arm, so the saline scratch rated a 2 instead of negative. That was a relief considering the Judge was rating all of the wheals as 2s or 3s.
Here’s the right arm after about an hour:
The first test showed that I was allergic to household dust, mold and feathers (possibly some others, but I didn’t see the final results of this test, since there’s more to do next week).
The food test showed that I was mildly allergic (the wheals were rated a ’1′ after the control scratch was figured in) to Egg Yolk, Peanuts, Flounder, Oysters, Pork and Tomato. Fun fun.
So it looks like I might have to watch what I eat a little more than I already do. And now I have another excuse for not eating oysters, for those situations where “because they’re gross” isn’t good enough.
Reyna’s allergy test was much simpler – just had to take some blood. They can do a stick test on dogs, but they usually have to sedate the dog, and that can skew the results.