What Should I Expect at The Skin Test?

[Spectra]

So, when we go to the allergist, and hopefully they will do the skin test, what do they do exactly?  Will it hurt my son, will he cry, will it be horrible?  Will it cause vomiting or is that only if he ingests the food?  If his skin does react will it make him severely uncomfortable??  What if there is no reactions what then?

[Mydreamcametrue]

I know for us, this is what they did.

First the allergist will talk to you and get a detailed history and make sure you do not leave anything out.

They should and BETTER do testing.  If they don't, I would demand they did.  You are driving 4 hours for this.

When they do the skin test, they will decide which foods to do.  Tyler had like 30 different ones.

They take a little needle like thing with the allergen and poke the skin with the allergen. 

Well first they write on his back, so they know where the poked each allergen.

The also poke one for the histamine to see how your body reacts. 

So anyhow, Tyler never cried, Zach never cried, When I did it, I wanted to cry.  It is very quick and fast though.

You then wait 15 minutes and watch his back.  If he is allergic, a red welp will appear.   The allergist comes back in and reads off the size of the welp. 

For Tyler, He showed nothing, nothing got red or big  (like a mosquito bite).

For Zach he showed up with big welps for different enviromental allergis and some foods.

For me, My back was all swollen because I showed major allergic to mold and then to 3 foods.

Really, after they prick him, you can sit and watch his back and see how each one reacts.

You can have false positive and negatives.  If the test shows negative to a food that you really suspect, I would hope the next step would be a blood RAST allergy test. 

I knew someone that her son kept having problems.  He was negative to everything with the blood and skin prick test.  FINALLY they saw an allergist that did the Skin Patch test.  This is where they actually put the allergen on your skin, cover it with a patch for 24 hours, since it could be a delayed reaction. 

After the 24 hours, they removed the patch and corn had actually burnt a whole in his skin.  That is how allergic he was, but it was a delayed reaction.

So I would talk to them about that also.

If he shows negative to everything, I would not stop there.  The next step would be a the other allergy test or a GI doctor doing a scope and taking biospies for allergies or EE.

Hugs, Wendy

[Spectra]

Holy moly!  I can't imagine that poor boy that had to deal with the corn burning a hole in his skin.  Thanks for all the info.  I am going to write those tests down so I don't forget to ask about them too.