Why Doesn't Every Food Allergy Parent Have Their Child Desensitized?

If you're naïve enough to think it is that easy then why don't you give us the answer for world peace too while you're at it? We're waiting...

PS - IF you had any medical knowledge you would know that food allergies can not be treated the same as environmental allergies because environmental allergies are inhaled and processed differently than food allergies that are processed through the gut...

Wow, what a simple solution that should be easily accessable and done for all.

How about you start the movement and fundraising so this can be possible?

Sorry, but this just screams 'troll post'... and it IS Friday.
Very over-simplified.

I'm guessing from the simple way you posed the question that you haven't done much research into it yourself?

1) cost
2) time
3) risk
4) ability to comply
5) no guarantees after 1, 2, 3 & 4
6) Availability of specialists for treatment

Need I go on?

You mean with all the extra money parents have lying around?

I am currently on immuotherapy for seasonal allergies. the cost to me OUT OF POCKET (after insurance pays their part) is $150/month.

I was going to do the clinical STUDY at University of Missouri for my food allergies - but you have to completely avoid ALL exposure for 3 months before the study and then for 18 months DURING the study. If you have ANY exposure at all - even a tiny bit then you run a higher than normal participation chance of not being de-sensitized.

Plus - for the drops they are very complex. You have 4 vials of liquid. You go from 1 drop to 2 drops to 3 drops each vial - in 7 day increments.
You have to not get the drops so they hit the teeth or the tongue. Then you have to hold the liquid under your tongue for 2 minutes. Then swish around for 30 seconds and swallow.
NO eating, drinking, exercise or anything that will increase your heart rate - like pooping (I'm not kidding) or showering for 20 min.

EVEN if you do all that for the food de-sensitization.... there's a pretty high chance that it won't work.

So - until my child was old enough to manage all that - which would be 8-9 at the youngest it's better to just stay away from whatever food you are allergic to (or manage the reactions, if not anaphylactic)

Plus - not all foods are approved by the FDA to be included.

It's not as easy as just saying "do it".

Because there is not a way to desensitize for food allergies. The only such thing I know about is a procedure to desensitize for peanut allergy. My granddaughter went thru that. It took many appointments. Because she was a part of a test the fees were minimal. I suggest that without that it would've been expensive. It takes professional time and equipment.

Even if there were such a procedure for all foods, one would have to go through it separately for each food. One could not desensitize to more than one food at a time. If one didn't one wouldn't know which food was causing the reaction. It would take several years of frequent appointments.

My granddaughter did achieve desensitization. She decided she doesn't like peanuts. After all she had not eaten peanuts in any form for 8 years. To maintain the lack of sensitivity she would have to repeat part of the test every so often. It really is a very time consuming and expensive process.

I would probably do it if my child was in known danger for anaphylactic shock. In the scheme of things the children who are in this position are a small percentage of all children.

Why do you ask? This question feels a bit insensitive. It implies that parents are remiss in not getting their child desensitized.

Anna!! What is your major anyway? You seem to have an eclectic mess of questions....

It doesn't always work and it isn't always an option. Plus, the allergy doctors all have different beliefs of what is right and wrong and the science of allergies is constantly changing. Doctors in the last few years have totally changed their views on how to manage allergies and are still really trying to figure out what is truly best.

Some anaphylactic children can react to a fleck of peanut dust in the air. Many children with an allergy that severe could not tolerate the process of going through desensitization.

It also isn't physically feasible for some parents to do it, as it requires daily trips to the doctor for at least a month (for a highly severe allergy).

While it sounds like a wonderful idea, it just isn't as easy, or as black and white, as it seems.

It's so, so new. There is not really any substantial research about it. For that alone, it's too risky. Since it is a new practice, there is not a lot of availability...and none of it is monitored by any health organization.

Why do you even ask, what's it to you?

Do you have a child with life threatening allergies? Have you had personal experience with this procedure? Unless your answer is "yes" to both questions, then you don't really have the right to ask.

My daughter has anaphylactic nut allergies and her doctor does not recommend the procedure. He says it is too new and not enough is known about it to try it on my daughter yet. I feel torn about it. I would love to remove the danger from her life, but I am afraid I could harm her by trying this. I am waiting to see what research shows in a couple of years.

Their was a great article in the NY Times magazine section a few months ago. It is apparently a very slow process with some risks. For kids w/ multiple allergies it can take years without any guarantees of either safety or efficacy. That said, I would certainly look into it if I had a highly allergic child. Research on this is very much ongoing and it sounds like there will likely be a multi center trial for desensitization for highly allergic kids with multiple allergies very soon (Stanford would be coordinating).

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/magazine/can-a-radical-...

I'm pretty sure Gladys, Anna, Carrie B... the same troll.

Jo, did you say her name was Anna? I thought it was Gladys? My we do have a few accounts, don't we?

ETA - Carrie B? I'll have to remember that one.

I think it's because there's no way to. If someone is that allergic, whyrisk their life when you can just carry a "pen" and cut the allergy thing out of their lives.

Some people do have their kids go through desensitization.
And sometimes it works.
Then they have to maintain it by eating peanuts and peanut butter several times a week.
I think it's interesting how avoidance makes it worse but gradually increasing exposure can greatly reduce the severity of the reaction.
Maybe school wide nut bans aren't such a good ideas.

http://www.askaboutmypeanutallergy.com/

http://www.cuh.org.uk/addenbrookes/news/2009/feb/peanut_a...

A close friend of mine did 2 out if the 3 years of shots to "cure" her allergies. After two horrible reactions from the shots, where she had to miss multiple days of work, she decided that it wasn't worth it.

My son has a peanut allergy. I worry sometimes when we are at places that serve food with peanuts. Occasionally he will get a random hive here or there, but luckily he doesn't have horrible reactions unless he eats it.

I'm hopeful he will out grow it.

i wish allergies were that easy to handle. but they're a complicated and confusing reaction that can't be dealt with en masse.
i spent YEARS dragging my kid to get the shots. his allergies were (and are) a slew of environmental ones, not food allergies, but oh, he was so miserable. the shots did make a difference. but we went there 3 times a week, gradually tapering off to once a month before quitting. YEARS. do you know how disruptive that is?
and today, at 22, he not only still suffers miserably from environmental allergies, but has developed fruit allergies too. his allergist said the shots didn't have anything to do with that, but i noticed that the week after i reported the new and alarming sensitivities, there was a notice on the office wall asking anyone who had developed new allergies to be sure to report them. i'm reasonably confident that within my lifetime there will be a 'new study' that indicates that acclimatization shots for environmental allergy sufferers carry the risk of causing food allergies. and 1-800-BAD-DRUG message attached.
khairete
S.

When my son was tested for nut allergy, the doctor told us he was off the charts for nuts and should avoid them. To desensitize him would risk causing a reaction. As it is he touched the shell of a nut because his cousin was playing with them and broke out in hives. He accidentally swallowed a nut that we didn't know was in a homemade item and went in to allergic shock.

To desensitize him would be to purposely expose him to a life threatening situation. Just sending him out in to the world on a daily basis is stressful enough.
He is on allergy medicine and asthma medicine.
He has other allergies to foods that he has been avoiding for years but were not life threatening and has accidentally had over that last few months. His reactions to those were much improved - a stuffy nose within an hour vs stomach cramps, vomitting and hives in the past. So I guess you could say that he is working on be desensitized to those. The main plan being complete avoidance.

On the other hand, I used to be allergic to milk. Drinking it would cause asthma attacks. As long as I carried my inhaler, I could manage. My grandmother introduced me to non-dairy creamer, and after a while, I found I was able to eat items with skim milk in them without having a reaction. Then I found that I could tolerate 1% and then 2%. To this day, I can tell when something has whole milk in it.

So again, it all comes down to the severity of the allergy.

That's a good question.
I dunno it might be the cost of treatment . But it it's a scientifically sound procedure.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/magazine/can-a-radical-...

I do wish people would do research before saying something isn't possible.

ETA - Jo, I got "had" again, didn't I...?

Original:
You haven't given us much to go on. Does EVERY desensitizing work? I don't think so...(not that I'm an expert or anything.)

I do know that allergy asthma can be helped by allergy shots. My sister had years of allergy shots and they really helped. Just being in the vicinity of a cat would make it so that she'd be in the hospital in an oxygen tent. The shots changed her life. It did take TIME, but it was worth it. 40 years of not going into the hospital on account of a cat is a huge deal.

I don't believe that they actually have the ability to desensitize peanut allergies. There are people who say that it's possible, but I think that's just people who want to make money who say it...

In Dallas there is a doctor doing this for the milk protein allergy.