Allergy test on a 14m old. What to expect? How distressing is it for them (and me) and how do they do it?

[DamonBradleylovesPippi]

We have just found out that DD2 (14m) might have an allergic reaction to polllen/hay/farm animals etc which affects her breathing quite badly (ended up in A&E and had to be given quite a lot of Salbutamol to relieve it).
GP wants to send her to have an allergy test done.
Any info you can give me is very much appreciated. Also anything re to asthma induced by similar things will be very helpful as well. I am very ignorant on the subject while DH is paranoid as he has been suffering from asthma, albeit iduced by other things and cronic.

TIA

[DamonBradleylovesPippi]

well?

[VelvetCushions]

Are you having skin prick tests?
I just got ds2 tested like that. I was more concerned with food allergies but they did test for pollen, dust mites and cat too.
They did it on his back whilst I held him tummy to tummy. I don't think the actual tests were uncomfortable for him but he was getting annoyed at being held and kept wanting to wriggle away. He was slighlty itchy afterwards where he reacted positive.

[chegirl]

Hello,

Sorry to hear about your DD's traumatic time

DS2 has severe atopic eczema. He had allergy tests done last year. He had the skin prick test. I have to say he has not forgotten it and I doubt he will ever forgive me.

I am not sure how painful it is but DS does not react well to pain (who does?) He was very upset. He has learning difficulties so although he is 6 he is much youger emotionally.

They used a scapel blade to scratch the skin, applied the allergen and drew a circle round it. They did this for dog, cat, tree pollen, grass pollen and house dust mite.

He had a strong reaction to all of them

It hasnt changed the treatment we use but I do think it has helped. Now I know I can target housecleaning, hoovering etc and if he is going out on a trip to the park for eg. I give him extra medication.

Your little one is very young so hopefully will get over the intial shock v.quickly. My other children definately would have done but DS2 is a little different.

Hope it goes ok for you and your DD

[Ineedmorechocolatenow]

My son has a fish allergy. We had skin prick and blood test. He had these at 26 months.

It was fine. The consultant made it fun, she drew on his arm and made a story out of it. He had a saline drop, a histamine drop (controls) then he had tests for salmon and cod.

Once she'd done this, she scratched through the drops with the top of a scalpel (sounds worse than it is, he didn't even flinch) and then waited for the results. He didn't react to any of them, even the histamine, which means the test didn't work. Apparently about 30% of people don't react to skin prick tests.

However, she confirmed that he had the allergy, as the history was so conclusive.

His blood test was fine too. The phlebotomist was lovely and distracted him with toys and stickers.

I was DREADING it, but he was absolutely fine.

Anyway, I hope this helps.

[trixymalixy]

My DS was skin prick tested at 7 months old and 19 month old. When he was 7 months old they did the skin prick test on his back and they did them on his arm when he was 19m.

Neither time bothered him at all.

They put a drop of the allergen on his skin and then pricked it with a kind of needle thing, wasn't a scalpel, so the allergen went under the skin.

They also do a negative (saline) and positive (histamine) control.

His arm did get a bit itchy, but not too bad.

[DamonBradleylovesPippi]

thanks a lot to you all. We are going to see the GP tomoroow who will do the referral so will know more about it then.
I'm a lot more relieved hearing what you said.