Dairy allergy only affecting bowel, anyone else?

[NotDoris]

Ok, so ds had his appointment yesterday and the doctor said that he has got an allergy to dairy, but they couldn't test for it as the allergy only affected his bowels so wouldn't show up in a blood test. We were told to stay off dairy and soya for now (soya cream cheese caused runny bum!) but when he is 12 months we should try adding tiny amounts of milk to his bottles and see how he reacts. We are to go back and see him again at 14 months.
We were also told to avoid egg, but not sure why. Ds has eaten cake with no reaction, and had scrambled egg without problems too- although he didn't like it very much and since then has had much more solid poo! Not sure if this is due to the egg, or the fact that he had been very runny for a while so we stopped giving him porridge/baby weetabix for breakfast and went back to baby rice.
Does anyone else have an allergy like this?

It sounds more like an intolerance than an allergy to me but obviously I'm not a medical expert! What type of doctor did you see - GP/consultant/allergy specialist? True allergies can normally be tested for using skin prick tests and/or blood tests. I've never heard of an allergy that only affects the bowel and can't be tested for. Intolerances on the other hand often only affect the digestive system and can't generally be tested for. Also don't understand why you were told to avoid egg without any form of testing or history of reactions.

That's what we thought!
We saw a paediatrician at the hospital. He was recommended by a doctor that we saw privately though, who specialises in paediatrics and allergies.
I did query the intolerance thing and was told something about IgE, ds doesn't have this?? His symptoms which led to diagnoses were failing to gain weight whilst breastfeeding, and a couple of pooey nappies with teeny tiny spots of blood in.

Ah, I think I know what you mean. I think you are referring to a non-Ige mediated allergy which is more like an intolerance as it doesn't involve anti-bodies. There's a good description of the two types of allergy and their symptoms on PIC's Facebook page: www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=218814971464653

I don't know a lot more than that about this type of allergy but I know that there are other regulars on this board who have kids with non-Ige allergies so hopefully one of them will be able to shed more light on the condition.

Thanks freefrommum, that's exactly what I was looking for!