Dr. Clinton Sexton  

Diet

(Part B)

Today we pick up with Part B of Diet. In Part A, we covered the basics of food sensitivity and allergy. Today I will explain food allergy and food sensitivity testing so you understand how they are used and how they may benefit you.

Understanding Food Tests

Food Sensitivities

Blood tests can be helpful when trying to isolate a food sensitivity or allergy; these tests measure how much your immune system is reacting to certain foods. This is an objective way to assess which foods may be aggravating your immune system.  This type of testing is often utilized by functional medicine doctors to help create an optimal diet for patients. The rest of this section is referring to food sensitivity testing. Now I also want to point out that there is not a “perfect” food test available today. What I mean is that you can have a food test run and it can provide a tremendous amount of information about how your immune system is reacting to different foods, but the immune system is a fluctuating system and if you ran the same test a few years later, you may get different results. Don’t let this discourage you. You only need to identify and remove enough of the key foods to resolve you digestion issues.

What I have seen in practice is that running these tests can be very useful in the hands of a doctor who knows how to apply the data they provide. I have been working with food tests for almost 20 years now and I can glean underlying patterns and information that are not clearly stated on the test. If you have had testing done and your doctor simply told you to avoid the positive foods, then you may have not gotten the full benefit if the test.

There are basically 2 major classes of food sensitivity testing used today. If you have been tested for food allergies by an allergist, they probably did not run these tests  (see Food Allergy Tests below). The 2 most common forms of testing are antibody testing and the 2 most common antibodies tested are IgG and IgA. These antibodies are produced by your immune system. Let’s say you have high levels of IgG antibodies to wheat, that is interpreted to mean that your immune system is launching and excessive attack against wheat. The greater the number of antibodies produced against a particular food the more of a problem it is considered to be.

There is another type of test that is less commonly used called the ALCAT test. This test measure how much your immune cells “react” or respond to a particular food.

The point you need to understand it that food sensitivity tests are designed to help isolate which foods your immune system has identified as an “enemy” to your body. There is one more thing you need to understand about food and the immune system is that the immune system should not be spending its efforts “fighting” food! Food won’t harm you, but bacteria, viruses and cancer cells will; and that is what it should be focusing its attention on. We want to remove “trigger” foods so that the immune system can calm down and not cause inflammation and other damaging effects to your digestive tract and body. Food sensitivities have been linked to autoimmune diseases and a very long list of other health problems.

Food Allergy Tests

You may have had a food allergy test performed by an allergist and this is measuring your immune system’s response to foods though a different antibody. They might measure an antibody called IgE (blood test) or perform a test on your skin (scratch test). To have a food allergy on blood tests then your immune system would be producing high levels of the IgE antibody to certain foods. Remember in that in food sensitivity testing different antibodies were measure (IgG and or IgA).

Ok, now lets keep this simple; if you have a food allergy blood test or a food sensitivity blood test then the level of antibody is being measured to certain food. So for allergy just remember that IgE is what is being assessed.

More women suffer with unknown food sensitivities; not food allergies. I have had many patients spend thousands of dollars of food allergy testing and be told they have no food allergies and that they can eat whatever they want. When I ran food sensitivity food tests we found significant food sensitivities. Once these foods were removed from their diet, they were able to heal their digestive tract and reclaim their health.

Histamine

I have also been able to use food sensitivity tests to identify hidden histamine intolerance issues; histamine intolerance is not a food allergy or sensitivity but it can cause many digestive problems for women like gas, bloating, loose stool or constipation. There are certain foods that are either high in histamine or they cause the body to release histamine (from the immune system). Common “histamine” foods include tomatoes, citrus, nuts, yeast, vinegar, alcohol, etc. Your digestive tract should be making an enzyme called DAO (Diamine Oxidase). This enzyme is produced in your small intestine and neutralizes excess histamine. The small intestine may not be working properly or damaged due to a variety of health problems such as leaky gut syndrome, SIBO, poor neurotransmitter production, food sensitivities, etc. In addition to or as a competently separate issue; you may have a problem with histamine.

Hopefully you now have a good understand of food sensitivities, food allergies and histamine intolerance. These involve immune system responses to food. This is how foods can contribute to poor digestive health.

If you think foods are contributing to your digestion problems and you are not sure what to do, contact my office to set up a consultation.

You will soon be receiving Part #2 of the Women’s Digestion Solutions heath series. In Part #2 we will be covering Digestion Nutrition.

Health and Happiness,

Dr. Sexton

If you would like more information about women’s digestion, functional medicine or Dr. Sexton contact our Naperville office or go to www.napervilleintegratedwelness.com

Do your own research, inform yourself and ask lots of questions. When collecting information you MUST consider the source. There is no shortage of false, misleading, outdated, profit-driven and utterly biased information in healthcare today; even from the most respected sources and organizations.

This approach to healthcare is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, mitigate, or prevent any disease. Why is this? The FDA enforces its position that these words can only be used with drugs. This approach does not use drugs.