It can be a relief to scratch the occasional itch, but when itch gets out of control, it can become a serious health problem. How does the body know when to stop?
Oct 13, 2023
0
41
Akhil Padmanabha knows about itching. His chronic itching caused by severe eczema was so debilitating that he was hospitalized twice and had to be home-schooled during most of his high school years. Itch so impacted his life ...
Sep 19, 2023
0
20
Simply the smell of seafood can make those with an allergy to it violently ill—and therefore more likely to avoid it. The same avoidance behavior is exhibited by people who develop food poisoning after eating a certain ...
Jul 13, 2023
0
139
New research is bolstering scientific understanding behind why some people are more prone to allergies than others. Researchers in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania identified how genetic differences ...
Jun 15, 2023
0
48
An allergen-specific inhibitor devised by researchers at the University of Notre Dame and the Indiana University School of Medicine has successfully prevented potentially life-threatening allergic responses to peanuts.
Feb 8, 2023
0
174
People with relatively high levels of lipids in their blood are less likely to develop allergic conditions such as eczema and asthma. These lipids cause genes that play a key role in allergic reactions to be less active. ...
Feb 6, 2023
0
59
Although many people with dietary allergies experience mild symptoms when exposed to triggering foods, some face potentially fatal consequences. A bacterial compound called butyrate that's made by healthy microbiomes has ...
Aug 21, 2022
1
209
Infants who were given a taste of peanut, milk, wheat and egg from the age of three months had a lower risk of developing a food allergy at the age of three years than controls, reports a study by researchers from Karolinska ...
Jul 5, 2022
0
175
In a multi-hospital analysis of individuals who experienced an allergic reaction to their first mRNA COVID-19 vaccine dose, all patients who went on to receive a second dose tolerated it without complications. The research, ...
Jul 26, 2021
0
306
In addition to a skin rash, many eczema sufferers also experience chronic itching, but sometimes that itching can become torturous. Worse, antihistamines—the standard treatment for itching and allergy—often don't help.
Jan 15, 2021
2
267
Allergy is a disorder of the immune system often also referred to as atopy. Allergic reactions occur to normally harmless environmental substances known as allergens; these reactions are acquired, predictable, and rapid. Strictly, allergy is one of four forms of hypersensitivity and is called type I (or immediate) hypersensitivity. It is characterized by excessive activation of certain white blood cells called mast cells and basophils by a type of antibody known as IgE, resulting in an extreme inflammatory response. Common allergic reactions include eczema, hives, hay fever, asthma, food allergies, and reactions to the venom of stinging insects such as wasps and bees.
Mild allergies like hay fever are highly prevalent in the human population and cause symptoms such as allergic conjunctivitis, itchiness, and runny nose. Allergies can play a major role in conditions such as asthma. In some people, severe allergies to environmental or dietary allergens or to medication may result in life-threatening anaphylactic reactions and potentially death.
A variety of tests now exist to diagnose allergic conditions; these include testing the skin for responses to known allergens or analyzing the blood for the presence and levels of allergen-specific IgE. Treatments for allergies include allergen avoidance, use of anti-histamines, steroids or other oral medications, immunotherapy to desensitize the response to allergen, and targeted therapy.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
