Posted on 01/07/2019 7:53:34 PM PST by BenLurkin
Of course they are but they need someway to become a victim and this is a real easy way to join the victim club.
JoMa
Most doctor’s office personnel (including the doctors themselves) don’t distinguish between the two either - I know this from experience. After a point the intellectual laziness just gets to be tiresome and one goes with the flow so that it is at least documented in a way that something that causes life threatening reactions doesn’t get prescribed.
I also try to tell doctors about certain migraine food triggers (because many meds have some of mine in them as derivatives or additives). They chalk these up to allergies as well, even when I know better.
Monotony? Sometimes you just want a bacon cheeseburger!
“40 years ago no one was allergic to peanuts”
I read not too long ago that researchers think the peanut allergies are manifesting because children are not exposed to soil, that is to say dirt, as much as they used to be when they were outside playing more. I guess the research continues... But it was an interesting article nonetheless.
I must be one of the few people in the world who simply loves to eat a well-prepared meal of liver, fried onions, and mashed potatoes. Calf's liver, coated with a salt-and-peppered flour coating, pan-fried to a crispy exterior, now that's a meal that I could eat at least weekly.
One of the great things of eating in the messhall was the evenings when they would serve liver. Normally, you were only allowed one pass through the serving line. On liver nights, they let me go back and get as many refills as I wanted.
My daddy was right there with you on the liver.
But the mess hall ruined mutton for him. He could barely sit down, even in the best restaurant, next to a rack of lamb.
It does. But apparently not nearly as prevalent as popular culture makes us believe.
I don’t have food allergies, but I have developed recently some medication allergies. And well before that, found I have some chemical allergy but still don’t know what it is. Only happened twice.
Peanut allergy reactions, like bee sting allergy reactions (Anaphylaxis) are real. Before my daughter became a nurse she was a paramedic and would treat patients with a shot of Epinephrine (she'd also likely do it in the ER now if called for). People can die if they truly have the reaction and aren't treated for it.
As to why it's now blasting all over AlGore's amazing interwebs, all I can say is the old adage "if it bleeds, it leads".
But I agree with the premise of this story, that there are more people who do not have the allergy but think they do.
I must be pretty “old school” but I think the difference is pretty important. To be honest, though, sometimes trying to explain the difference is difficult and time-consuming, not to mention fighting an uphill battle. I’ve spent considerable time painstakingly explaining the difference to folks and found that the effort was to no avail.
These days, with EMR, there’s probably not really a way to differentiate in the documentation between allergy, adverse reaction, or migraine trigger, unless it’s set up so that both the “allergen” and the reaction is listed: food or medication: chocolate; reaction: migraine trigger.
If someone tells me that they had a genuine serious reaction to a medication, I do try to reinforce that they really do need to never take that medication again. I’ve also had people say “that was years ago, I don’t know if I’m still allergic” and I strongly discourage experimentation to find out. (Years ago I encountered a case of someone who did exactly that with disastrous results).
Allergic reactions can be life-threatening. Adverse reactions tend not to be as serious (although they are often things we don’t want to experience).
Why the difference could be important? An example: One of my sons, when a baby/toddler, was given a particular antibiotic. He didn’t develop an allergy to it, rather, he had severe GI upsets to the point that we stopped giving it to him. If that had been called an “allergy” then that medication (still in use) and its close relatives would not be available to him if he needed them. Now he’s an adult, and that family of antibiotics is open to him, if he needs them.
My other son had an allergic reaction to an antibiotic. (Hives and swelling). Although that particular medication is seldom used these days, he should never take it. Would he react the same way, all these years later? It’s not worth taking a chance on.
Another example: 325 mg aspirin, chewed and swallowed, can help stop a heart attack. I’m having symptoms of a heart attack; I’ve said I’m allergic to aspirin. What kind of reaction did I have? If it causes my lips to swell and my breathing to become difficult, I’m not taking the aspirin. If it makes me feel slightly nauseated, I’m taking it right now (while I’m calling 911 and waiting for the ambulance).
I think I understand. I developed swelling in my joints after being on penicillin for about five days. I’ve always assumed it was an allergy, but have never known for sure.
No real problems with any other antibiotic - or for that matter any drug - I’ve been prescribed; though with many, like pain medicine, I just don’t like the way I feel.
Philippines are the only ones I know who seek them out. I ate one or two of ours and it was not to my liking. My wife made juice.
Love those things! I like Wendys Baconator.
I think it was not that it was terrible. Some people actually choose to eat it. I think it was that it showed up time after time after time on the menu.
My mom had an allergy to aspirin. This also meant there were other medicines as well as foods she had to avoid. That did not stop some doctors from prescribing the very medicines she had to avoid. Fortunately she or the druggist always caught this at the pharmacy counter.
I think that’s it. In the 1800s, workmen, servants and prisoners in New England even got sick of lobster and demanded that it only be served to them a certain number of days per week. It wasn’t always/everywhere considered the delicacy that it is now, and anything gets old if it’s constant fare.
I like chipped beef on toast. Not crazy about lobster.
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