new results no good :P

[Comma2]

DD 2 yo had a skin test today, and it's crap. Besides of Peanut through the roof, she's had a class 2 (scale 1-4) reaction for milk, peas, chicken, pork, oranges, and all tree nuts besides pecan (weird: 0). Her weals were much smaller than the red around, which the allergist thought strange.

I swear to god, this kid does not have an allergy to chicken, pork, or oranges! She's been eating them regularly and nothing. Cheese is fine too, pure milk gives her hives. peas she had a reaction (hives) 6 mths ago when I last gave them to her, and she's never had nuts. So what the bloody hell do these results tell me then?? Absolutely nothing?? The allergist suggested to not give her any of the class 2 allergens and call her in 3 months to tell if I see any difference. In WHAT I would like to know?? The kid's perfectly healthy and happy! grrrr.

Also I would like to know, if it's such a crap shoot with the skin test and class 2, does it mean she may not be allergic to the tree nuts, either? Not going to give her any, but it's not like its not hugely inconvenient and SCARY. All for nothing?? She's doing fine with chocolate 'processed on nut eqippmnt' etc, so I know that cross contamination not a huge issue, at least.

Wtf do I do now? stand on my head to not give her cheese, pork, chicken and oranges when she's fine with them?? Why is this all so ambiguous aka fishy?

Sorry you've had such a confusing experience. Can I ask why they tested for pork, chicken and oranges if they weren't causing any problems? Seems a really random selection of stuff to test for

Do you know how big the weals were to the things your DD tested positive for? DS tested positive for apple, but the weal was only 2mm and our consultant advised us that anything at 1 or 2mm was unlikely to cause a problem. Also, apple being quite acidic would be more likely to cause a weal even if not a problem to eat. Sure enough, DS has eaten plenty of apple since with no reaction. Could this be the case with orange too?

If it were me, I don't think I would stop giving foods that she is fine with. Allergies make your diet difficult enough without cutting out foods that are not a problem...

Sorry, just re-read. When you say scale 1-4 does that mean mm?

This is the table for the US scaling system:
Scale 0 : wheal < 4 mm, erythema < 5 mm
+/-: wheal 5-10, erythema 5-10
1: 5-10, 11-20
2: 5-10, 21-30
3: 10-15, 31-40
4: 15, 40

The class 2 allergens for here were mostly 5 mm for the wheal and 20-30 for the red area. Her peanut was 29/60, poor thing. So I guess the wheal itself could have been a class 1 reaction too, which already doesn't make sense.
And those apparently were standard common-allergen panels they checked (we're in NYC), plus an extra panel for the nuts.

Didn't realise you were in the US . Odd, DS had a 3mm weal to baked egg so according to those figures he's unlikely to be allergic (raw egg was another story...) but we have been advised to avoid .

In that case I have no clue! Seems odd that your DD is eating foods with no problem but testing positive. Of course, it is always possible to get a false positive (believe me, I dream of being told that DS's nut result is just that ) but I don't understand why you would be told to cut out those foods if they are being tolerated. Something we were told at our last hospital appt was that because DS is not allergic to peanut we must give it to him and keep giving it regularly because it's when you give it and leave a gap of months before giving it again that you are likely to see an allergy develop. For that reason I would be wary of cutting out those foods that your DD has tested positive to but is currently tolerating. I may be completely wrong but that would be my instinct.

The tests are just an indication of possible allergy, the only true test is to ingest. DS tested negative to milk, but failed the milk challenge.

If she has been happily eating all those things with no reaction then I would continue to give her them, but not give the things she testes positive to that she has never had before e.g. Peanuts.

Why did they test such a random selection of things? Chicken and pork are definitely not standard on the list of allergens they test for at DS's allergy clinic.

Maybe Americans need to be tested for different things? Those were just standard panels...

Thanks for your responses. I'll keep giving what she tolerates but nothing new...this trip really didn't help any, wished I'd taken her to the playground instead. :P

i dont think a red wheal around the blister is at all strange, sounds quite normal to me, my sons flares creep up his arms, and we dont really get too concerned, the peanut and dustmite allergy are pretty severe...

i am puzzled by the pork , orange chicken and peas, was this because you brought them up as suspect foods?

did he test for egg allergy as peanut and egg often go hand in hand?

and i think , personally that avoidance of all chocolate products with nut traces is a bit risky. nut traces doesnt mean traces, it can mean pieces of nuts and due to manufacturing process it does mean 'may' , and its a gamble each time iyswim.

I understand the test for peas, as 5% of peanut allergic kids are allergic to other legumes, was this again a suspect food for your child?

milk allergy is often outgrown, how did the allergist explain the ability to eat cheese but not milk? did he/she think it was because of the chance of outgrowing?

how is your childs general health, what advice did your allergist give on ezcema, enviromental allergies or asthma? if this was poor, i would consider perhaps changing your immunologist, if yr insurance would cover this?

why isnt your allergist explaining your results to you? randomly doing tests on small child without explanation is pretty poor imo.

demand better from your medical person is my advice!

I get odd skin allergy reactions as does dd. I get hay fever but if you pin prick test me with grass pollen, my whole arm swells up like a balloon. Some people have v sensitive skin reactions which is why skin pin prick tests are not a totally reliable indicator of severity.

Also if they did all those skin pricks at once and she had one severe reaction, it may have affected the rest. If I get tested for mould and grass pollen and milk together all come up but milk on its own doesn't.

Dh is allergic to chicken. They do check it as a food group especially if you are allergic to egg (he has chicken and egg allergy!).

Yes, dd had egg (and soy) and outgrew it. This morning for bf she had a bit of cheese and one piece of orange (also cornflakes, soymilk, wheat germ, flax seed, and banana) and there were indeed some tiny red hives around her mouth. So I think what I must do is keep her clean for a day, then test 1 of the new allergens for dinner.....ugh! Why does she come up with new allergies????

That's really interesting with the synergistic effects of multiple testing....especially as it would work in my favor! :)

...but even if she has tiny red hives....is that worse than not having orange? She loves them!

DD overall health is exellent, growing and gaining, has 1 tiny patch or recurring eczema on shoulder (who doesn't), is happy as a frog....an no, allergist had no real advise on anything, besides of keeping allergens out of way. Not sure there is a better one anywhere though, the one before barely knew about peanut allergies. Also not sure what she would say otherwise, as kid is obviously well together otherwise.