Achieve Better Gut Health With Delayed Food Allergy Testing

If we are what we eat, then consuming a diet filled with nutritious foods, proteins, vitamins, minerals and water is critical to maintaining a balanced and productive lifestyle. However, some foods that are normally good for most people could prevent your body from functioning smoothly if you have a food allergy, intolerance or sensitivity.

Learn more about how your diet could be impacting your body’s immune response and how delayed food allergy testing and treatment solutions offered by our functional medicine clinic in Springfield, Missouri can help improve your gut health.

How Are Inflammation and Food Allergies Connected?

Inflammation is a defense mechanism that your body uses to remove harmful chemicals from your system. Your body’s immune response flares up whenever it feels threatened by a bruise, cut, bacteria or virus as well as otherwise harmless pollen, dust, or food. A poor diet, environmental toxins and stress contribute to inflammatory processes as well.

Acute inflammation is one of the two types of inflammation. It has a short duration, and it involves symptoms like redness, heat, swelling, and pain.

Chronic inflammation occurs when the body works in overdrive, which takes place during an allergic reaction to food. Your immune system is immediately triggered when normally non-threatening food proteins called allergens enter the body.

This system makes antibodies to attack the allergens, and they release chemicals that lead to vomiting, hives, difficulty with breathing, severe joint pain, and other symptoms.

Scientists now believe that much of our immune system is in our digestive tracts, which is where inflammatory reactions like stomach aches and nausea occur. Several studies have also found that eight different types of foods cause about 90% of all food allergy reactions:

  • Eggs
  • Peanuts and tree nuts
  • Milk
  • Soy
  • Wheat
  • Fish and shellfish

Food Intolerance, Sensitivity and Inflammation

Although a food intolerance is not as severe as most food allergies, it is more common to have. Many adults are lactose intolerant, which means that their systems are unable to digest and process dairy products. Symptoms like inflammation and swelling, weight problems, low energy levels, and irritable bowel syndrome are often associated with a food intolerance.

A food sensitivity is a complex non-allergic, non-celiac inflammatory reaction that can involve both innate and adaptive immune pathways upon exposure to certain foods, such as ones containing gluten. While they are not life-threatening, uncomfortable symptoms like rashes, joint pain, and stomach cramps are common to have.

Testing for Inflammation

Many people are unsure about the type of food allergy that they have or the foods that they are intolerant or sensitive to. Kare Health and Wellness offers several testing options to help you identify your condition as well as determine the next steps:

  • We administer various blood tests, such as the CRP (C-reactive protein) test. If there are high levels of this protein in the bloodstream, it could be a sign of an infection or inflammatory disease.
  • The Antinuclear Antibody Test (ANA Test) determines whether or not you have antinuclear antibodies in your blood. This could be an indicator of an autoimmune disorder.
  • The Food Allergy Test helps identify the amount of IgE antibodies in your blood. Having high amounts could mean that your body overreacts to allergens, which is a possible indicator of a food allergy.
  • The Food Sensitivity testing helps identify the amount of IgA and IgG markers indicating a delay response or sensitivity to common foods, spices, and additives.

Treating Inflammation

It is essential to address chronic inflammation as early as possible. Having consistent amounts of inflammation can result in your body being in a constant state of emergency. This has the potential to damage essential organs and even lead to severe diseases, such as a stroke or heart disease.

Kare Health and Wellness follows three essential steps when helping patients treat symptoms of chronic inflammation:

  1. Remove offensive foods or factors.
  2. Repair the gut through therapies and supplementation:
    • Our infrared sauna uses advanced LED technology that heats the body from the inside, reducing inflammation by circulating oxygen throughout.
    • We have a broad menu of IV Therapy options with a variety of positive effects, from eliminating harmful toxins to boosting the immune system.
    • Our featured supplements for this month are Turiva, Traumeric, InflammaCORE, Fish Oil, CollaGEN, and Baxyl. Each of them supports a normal inflammatory balance by incorporating natural ingredients that have been used for healing purposes over several centuries.
    • A relaxing and rejuvenating lymphatic massage increases lymph flow throughout the body, which helps ease inflammation and swelling.
  1. Restore balance by slowly reintroducing foods. This helps avoid spikes in inflammation later on.

If you have further concerns about inflammation and how your diet might be playing a role, please reach out to Kare Health and Wellness at 417-881-4994. With our customized delayed food allergy testing options and rejuvenating gut health treatment solutions, we will help you address the root cause of your symptoms so that you can restore your health and get your life back on track.

Keri Sutton - RN, MSN, ANP-C, AGPCNP-BC

Keri is a Nurse Practitioner and founder at Kare Health & Wellness. Keri's pursuit of personal answers to her own health issues landed her in the top of Functional Medicine. As she utilized functional Medicine to get her own health and life back, she made it her life's work to bring this empowering form of healthcare to as many people as she can.

About Us

Our mission is to create a safe environment for our patients to share their story and be empowered to take control of their health.  We constantly challenge patients to think differently about their health. We never find contentment in simply being disease free. We want to help patients optimize their vitality of life so that they can strive for things that they thought were unattainable.

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