The Basic Facts About Allergies

When a person experiences allergies, they are having an abnormal response of the immune system to what are otherwise harmless substances in the environment. The substances can vary from animal dander, pollen, mold, trees or weeds just to name a few.

When your body reacts to the allergen (the substance you are allergic to), it produces a very specific antibody, called IgE that binds to the allergen.

Antibodies attach to form blood cells called mast cells. You can have mast cells in your airway, your GI tract, and other places in your body.

The mast cells release a bunch of different chemicals including histamine. The histamine causes some of the allergy symptoms we experience such as itchiness, sneezing and runny nose.

You can have different degrees of symptoms from mild, to moderate and even severe symptoms such as anaphylactic shock. Mild symptoms include the appearance of a rash, being itchy, or having watery eyes or having nasal congestion. Mild reactions are localized and do not spread to other parts of the body.

Moderate allergy symptoms include symptoms that do spread to other parts of the body such as itchiness from systemic hives or difficulty breathing.

A severe allergic reaction is usually life threatening. The symptom is an intense one that affects the entire body. The symptoms can spread rapidly from one part of the body to another.

The term, "allergen", refers to the actual substance that is triggering your allergy symptoms. An allergen can be something outside or it can be something inside your home or it can be a food item. If the allergen that is causing your symptoms is in the air, you are likely to have symptoms such as watery eyes, congested nose, or coughing. If the allergen is something you ate, the allergic symptom will more likely be something that has to do with your mouth, stomach or your intestine as in itchy mouth or throat, stomach upset or diarrhea and abdominal cramping. When you are having a severe allergic reaction and enough chemicals (histamines) are released from your mast cells that can cause a reaction that is involving more than one system in your body or that is spread throughout your body such as hives, decreased blood pressure, loss of consciousness or shock.

Not everyone has allergies and those who do have usually inherited them, which means that they have been passed on to children from parents who suffer from allergies. What is passed on it not a specific allergy but the tendency to have allergic responses within the body. If a child is born with only one parent having allergies that child has a 50% chance for developing allergies. If a child is born with both parents having allergies than that child has a 75% chance for developing allergies.

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