Allergy testing for babies

[louli]

My DS is one and is going to be allergy tested soon as we know he is dairy & soya intollerant already. Has anyone had their baby tested and what did it involve?

Ds had allergy tests done at around 1 year. It involved taking blood from his arm and identified a list of allergies as long as my arm. He was given skin prick tests at 3, plus further blood tests and these showed he had grown out of many of the allergies. The skin prick tests dont hurt at all, a series of tiny pricks are made along the inside of the arms and then drops of different allergens are put onto each prick mark. Within 15 minutes any allergy will be apparent because of redness / spots. The blood tests were momentarily uncomfortable as they involved a needle. Good luck with it all.

Thanks Bunny. I have also been reading the Strep thread and read your messages their. I carry Strep and DS contracted it during labour and had to have IV anti-b's for a week. Good luck with the IV anti-b's in labour.

have all your tests been arranged via a doctor or can it be done privately? I know health shops & homeopaths etc do them but would prefer something more clinical.

It will be done in hospital, I agree with you it feels much better doing it there.

My ds had the skin pricks this week on his back. They didn't hurt, he didn't even notice. You do need someone good to interpret the results though - for instance milk and peanut only raised slightly - but that's because he is not exposed to them through my breastmilk. Egg on the other hand was a massive lump, becaus I was still eating that.
At 1 year is he being tested for grass pollen and dust mites? I have seen some new research about giving zirtec to 1 year olds who test positive for this to avoid asthma later on.

louli, my son was allergy tested as a baby, too, at around 9 months and then about a year later. The first was the blood test, the second a skin test. Both kinds had numerous false positives, so if you get a laundry list of allergies, make sure to check them against what you already know. (According to the tests, my son was extremely allergic to wheat.. except that he's not, iyswim.) If there are suspected allergies, you might want to confirm with an elimination diet, but your allergist should advise you on that.

Anyway, my son was extremely allergic to milk and mildly to soya. He's grown out of both, but if you'd like recipes or anything like that, feel free to contact me.

Thanks for your messages. I am sure his milk allergy will come up as strong but beyond that I am not sure.

JJ, was your son on Nutramigen? Did you use their recipes?

louli, we were in the US until he was 2 and a bit.. I just breastfed him until he was 2 and then switched to water and juice for drinks. He just tested out of the allergy (he's 5 1/2).

With my second (also allergic to milk, but not as bad and for not as long), I had a tin of Neocate, but breastfed and supplemented (once in a blue moon) with water. He tested out of it while still under a year old (food challenge).

Didn't use the formula recipes -- sorry! I do have a good one for a milk and soya-less cake. I found that it's better to find recipes that don't call for milk/butter/soya than to substitute things. Some of the best cookbooks I used were picked up at used book markets and came from the time just after the war when all that was in short supply. (My favourite was by Marguerite Patten, but it's not at this house, unfortunately!)

Thanks Louli . We used Nutramigen, smelt horrible but ds didnt seem to mind.

i was told that it was not possible to do an allergy test on my one year old for fish until she had eaten it to kick off the body's immune system. it sounds like you could get tests before this; what do you think?

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