Egg Allergy please help

[NickyJB]

My ds had a reaction to egg on the weekend. There are lots of allergies in mine and my dh family so i was on the look out for any reactions. He came out in red rash around his mouth and neck about 5 mins after eating the egg. He only had a tiny mouthful so i was quite concerned about how sever the reaction was. Can anyone give me any advise on what i should do now? I have booked a GP appt for next mon. How easy is it to live with an egg allergy? Any help/advise would be really apprechiated.

my ds1 and my dh have egg allergies, it is prety tricky to start with, until you get used to looking at all the labels when you shop. i remeber the first shop with my dh when we moved in, i would pick things up and he would take them back out of the trolley and put them on the shelf!
but you kind of get used to it. the main difficulty now is when we eat out. once asked for an egg free roast dinner and they brought out roast beef and yorkshire puddings!
most supermarkets now do egg free pasta, sauces etc and have sections in the 'free from' ranges so thats where we get most of our shopping form and i have had to adapt to doing lots of cooking from scratch. easy if you stick to simple things like pasta with sauce and meat and veg or vegetable bakes.

It is not too bad. DS was allergic to dairy & egg but it is just egg now. The only thing I find tough is other childrens b-day parties with cakes and things. Good luck!

DD had that reaction at 6 months to french toast (hives all round mouth and bottom of face) and again at 12 months to a tiny bit of scrambled egg left on smoked salmon (less violent reaction) BUT she has no reaction to eggs in cake or other foods

think it really depends on how severe the reaction is and to what and also on the age .. given time they can grow out of it .. that's what I'm hoping

DS is only 6 months old and when i asked the HV today if he will be allergy tested she said not until 15 months. Im concerned about how severe the allergy is and whether this could be picked up on a test.

Food shopping could be quite time consuming in the future, im allergic to fish so i already have to check all packaging!

Big important question..... Will DS be able to eat macdonals??

Louli - my first thought was how bad bday parties would be. Poor little DS was born on xmas day so already he's not going to be very impressed!

u can get egg free stuff on prescription, my ds gets biscuits,pasta,bread,cake mixes but i had to go through the hospital dietitcoan,tell your gp u want referring to a dietitcian and then they write to the gp telling them to prescribe the foods

Thanks Jenk1. What age did you DS become allergic and what tests did they give him?

Nicky, I hope your GP has provided you with a list of food you need to avoid if your ds comes from a family with a history of allergies.

The ones that I remember at the moment are:
-No egg before 1 yr old
-No glutten before six months
-No cow's milk befre 1 yr old
-No whole nuts until 5 yrs
-No orange juice until 1 yr old (not sure about this one, but definitively not an early weaning food)
-And if you can, avoid the Dirty Dozen (look for it at the Organix web site)

DS is allergic to tomatoes, nuts, egg, and has a loooong list of food intolerances. THe reactions vary considerable for example, DS can eat tomato as long as it doesn't touch the skin. But it's always good to err on the side of caution and remove the ingredient all together.

Something that worked really well for us was Gina Ford's The Contented little Baby Book of Weaning as it has a very good program to introduce first foods that allows you to try the ingredient for three days and check for reactions. If you keep a diary you will be more likely to spot which foods do present problems. That doesn't meant that he will be allergic to that food all his life, you may try them again after some time when the gut may be a bit more developed, though in some cases you will be asked to remove the ingredient completely until your DS has been diagnosed.

I wish I could tell you that access to allergicians is great but it's quite the opposite, until you get an appointment (that could take years in certain parts of England) your best friend is the food diary.

Hope I have been of help.

There is a great recipe on the BBC webite for eggfree choc cake. It is by an italian chef. I will try and find it for you. Very important for Birthdays

www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/egglesschocolatecake_67164.shtml

Here it is. Not sure how do link

Eaney! you will be my hero if you can provide such info! I will keep an eye on this thread

Ooops! crossposted. Thank you ery much

ery??? very

Chandra. Thank you so much for that list. I think that i haven't been given very good advise by HV/GP. I've mentioned it to them many times about all the allergies in the family - im allergic to fish and nickle and coeliac disease in Dh family and my dad and brother have asthma, hayfever and excema. So all in all a nice cocktail of allergies which gave ds a very good chance of developing some too. I was told to hold off on Gluten until 8 months but that was all.
I am going to be really careful from now on and avoid all the foods you mention. I have been doing the Gina 3 day weaning thingy and im really glad otherwise i wouldn't have been so sure that it was a reaction to the egg.
Eaney - thank you for the choc cake recipe, i will get baking! Yum yum
Allergies are complex things, i wish that there was more research into them and that testing was more readily available. Thanks everyone for your help. I'll post back and let you know what GP says.

sorry it is DD not DS that has the egg allergy, they wouldnt do any tests on her so young, she was about 8 months when i started keeping a food diary and presented it to the gp,she then referred her to the paediatrician who then referred her to the dietician,she is now 15months and i am hoping at the next visit to get her tested for allergies

it isn't too bad to avoid egg, nickyjb, we did for a while but he's grown out of it. Can't say exactly when that was because I didn't retest very often but they often outgrow it by 5. As people have said already the main problem is cake. As its egg white that causes most reactions you may find he can have egg yolk but not the white. If an allergy is severe it is possible to get tests before 15 months but the only people I've met who had tests very early had babies who'd already had anaphylactic reactions. Its pretty hard to get blood out of young children so they don't do it unless there's a very good reason.

Inisst your gp refers you as the queues are very long. The consultant will decide how urgent they think it is and hence when they see you.

I'd add Tomatoes and kiwi fruit to Chandra's "not before 1 if there's a history of allergy" list. Both are common allergens.

In answer to the all important question - yes he will be able to have McDonalds. They produce a list of products with the allergens ticked or crossed, you have to ask for it.

The onlt problem with McDonalds is Seasame seeds. My DS is allergic to Eggs, Seasame Seeds, Chickpeas and cheese. He used to be allergic to cows milk but can tolerate it well now.

BTW the chef with the eggless cake recipe on the BBC website has a superallergic daughter. I wish he would write a comprehensive cookbook for allergy sufferers.