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Spring is the season of allergies which can be reduced!

15/9/2019

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It’s spring again (at least in Brisbane where I am!), which is the season of hayfever and allergies for many people. For these people, the new plant growth, grasses, flowers and pollen can be a very frustrating time. But it need not be…

Allergies and intolerances or sensitivities are abnormal immune system responses to foods or chemicals in your environment. Allergies to various foods and chemicals can be deadly in some people, and intolerances or sensitivities can be hard to identify, but all can be very detrimental to your health. Allergies can be very stressful for the sufferer as well as their families, as the allergen can be hidden in many foods or meals, despite their best efforts to avoid it.

Symptoms of allergies, intolerances or sensitivities can include frequent sneezing, coughing, rashes, itchy skin, sinus congestion and pain, headaches and migraines, congested throat and nose, digestive complaints of pains and bloating, and other symptoms. If you have these symptoms regularly, it is important to find the cause(s) and prevent worsening of symptoms or developing into more chronic health issues.

Some recent Australian research has been on trying to reduce peanut allergies, particularly in children. The new research is retraining the body’s immune system to develop a tolerance to peanuts using very small amounts and gradually increasing, in conjunction with specific strains of probiotic bacteria!

The new research into probiotics for allergies is very exciting, and again shows the importance of your digestive bacteria to your health! This is one reason why I use targeted probiotic strains for specific health conditions like allergies, intolerances or other conditions, but also together with other techniques and treatments such as herbal medicines and nutritional medicine, healing the digestive system and balancing the immune system, which all plays a part in reducing the effects of allergies and intolerances!

I  wouldn’t recommend you just take probiotics for your allergy, as the abovementioned research used tiny amounts of the triggering substance over an 18 month period (under medical supervision) to develop a reduced immune system response. Other aspects of treating allergies, intolerances and their symptoms are needed too!

Many allergies or intolerances/sensitivities can be hard to identify yourself, but I do have access to several pathology tests for checking your responses to 50, 96, or more foods or chemicals with a simple test from a blood spot or blood or even hair sample. This is the easiest and quickest way to identify what might be causing your symptoms.

If you have seasonal hayfever, now if a great time to start getting some help to prevent and reduce your allergy symptoms! I have been seeing quite a lot of allergies, hayfever, hives and other similar symptoms recently, and have seen amazing improvements in all cases!
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If you or someone you know suffers from allergies or intolerances, we would love to help you reduce your symptoms and improve your health! 
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food intolerances or sensitivities can cause chronic issues

24/2/2019

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I see a lot of people, mostly children, with intolerances and sensitivities to any number of foods, food ingredients or environmental  substances. The number of people with such intolerances or sensitivities appears to be increasing at a rapid rate. So what might be causing these issues?

But firstly, what are some symptoms to look out for in yourself or your children?

Common symptoms of intolerances and sensitivities can include:
- constant or recurring runny nose, and having to blow nose frequently
- clearing of throat by coughing frequently, especially after waking in the morning
- sinus infections or pressure
- frequent tummy upsets, with sudden or frequent diarrhoea
- bloating of lower abdomen and lots of gas/flatulence
- frequent infections such as throat infections, colds and flu
- foul or smelly breath
- frequent enlarged or infected tonsils and adenoid glands, or had them removed due to being enlarged
- skin rashes, eczema, or itchy skin
- having a horizontal crease across the lower part of the nose
- sunken and/or dark circles under the eyes, as shown in the meme photo.

Many people think that these intolerances are "allergies" and use this term to describe the reactions or symptoms they see. Allergies and intolerances are both immune system reactions to triggering substances, but they are very different! Intolerances such as to dairy or gluten (as in Coeliac Disease) are an IgG immune system response, whereas allergies are a more severe IgE response.

People also believe that if you avoid the food or substance that you are intolerant to in the same way as for allergies - ie, complete avoidance, you actually have a high risk of developing new intolerances to MORE substances. I've seen this in some clients and in published research.

Hence intolerances need to be treated quite differently to allergies! In addition, failure to identify various intolerances and act on them can result in ongoing symptoms and development of chronic health conditions.

Because of the delayed reaction of symptoms  appearing with intolerances, it can be very difficult to identify what are your individual triggers! But there are some very good pathology tests using blood or hair samples which can identify 50-500 different food and environmental triggers which cause intolerance symptoms. Bear in mind that allergy tests will not identify intolerances or vice versa.

If you see the "allergy shiners" under your eyes or other intolerance symptoms or in your children or family, please look into getting an intolerance test to identify what is causing these issues, and then make some adjustments to  dietary intake or lifestyle to reduce exposure, to improve health! I can help with testing and recommendations from the test results!

Do you have any known intolerances and what are they? Or do you suspect some intolerances but are not sure what is causing them?
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Is gluten really the problem?

16/3/2018

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This is part 2 of my series about gluten-free diets, as it's Coeliac Awareness week! Coeliac Disease is a severe intolerance to gluten (allegedly). Is gluten really an issue and are gluten-free products actually healthier for you?
 
In my experience, I have seen clients who have tested negative for Coeliac, but they react badly when they have gluten-containing foods. But some of them will be fine when they have "gluten-free" products but some won't be, while others are fine on "certified organic" wheat/rye products, but others won't. In believe there are several groups of people who react to wheat products, including some people who have:

1) A gluten intolerance - ie, Coeliac disease confirmed by multiple pathology tests, or
2) An intolerance to other nutrient components of wheat, such as lectins or fructans, which in susceptible people can cause the same symptoms, but not testing positive to a Coeliac test, or
3) A sensitivity or toxicity to glyphosate (ie, Roundup herbicide) which is sprayed on GMO wheat and many other food products, but which doesn't come out in the processing of such products.

The use of Roundup/glyphosate, I believe, is a huge and hidden cause of many digestive and other physical health issues, because it can cause a dysfunction in your digestive bacteria, as shown in a lot of recent research.  Roundup/glyphosate is linked to causing many symptoms, including headaches and migraines, digestive pains, infertility, toxicity and even cancer and autism.

Will eating a gluten-free diet help in these situations to improve your health? The answer is... probably not! If you have an intolerance to wheat, eating gluten-free will do nothing good for you - it may cause the same symptoms!  And if you have Coeliac Disease, you need to do far more than just avoid gluten - you must also avoid some other foods, and work on healing your digestive system, and reducing the damage that the autoimmune component of Coeliac Disease is causing.

Some research shows that completely cutting out foods to which you may be intolerant can actually cause you to become intolerant to MORE food ingredients, and cause nutrient deficiencies to make your health worse.

So what should you do?  See me for advice!

Sensitivities or allergies to certain foods or environmental substances can be reduced by retraining your body to become less reactive to those substances. This can be done with a combination of improved nutrient intake, healing the digestive system, and togother with other treatments. If allergies and intolerances are a problem for you or someone you know, I can help!

See part 3 of this topic coming soon!

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Is EATING GLUTEN-free FOOD a good choice for your health?

14/3/2018

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This week is Coeliac Awareness Week in Australia, so I have written a series of short articles on gluten, gluten-free foods and Coeliac Disease. This first article gives some background on this condition and how gluten can affect your health.

There has been a massive growth in the amount and choice of gluten-free products in our shops over the past few years. This is due to more and more people having reactions and symptoms to eating gluten-containing foods. Considering that many of  the "gluten-free" foods have never actually had gluten in them, is this all a fad or just clever marketing?!

Firstly, what is gluten? Gluten is a protein found in wheat, rye and barley grains, that's all! The word gluten comes from Latin, meaning "glue", as it gives dough its elasticity, helping it to rise and giving the end product its chewy texture. There's no gluten in oats or rice, but these grains do have similar proteins to which some people can still react to. Some people can react with coeliac-like symptoms with other foods, probably because of cross-contamination in food processing factories of gluten getting into other foods.

Different people can have a different reaction to wheat or gluten in foods - an allergy, an intolerance or sensitivity, an autoimmune reaction, or nothing noticed at all. Those who are "sensitive" or "intolerant" to gluten can have reactions ranging from mild to severe and which can include extreme digestive pains, headaches and migraines, diarrhoea, brain fog, skin conditions, mucus congestion, reflux and more symptoms. A severe intolerance to gluten can be diagnosed as Coelic Disease after several pathology tests are performed with the results showing a positive reaction to gluten AND specific antibodies, or a genetic test, and an endoscopy with biopsy to confirm. Coeliac Disease is an autoimmune condition, where the immune system is attacking the body's tissues.

An intolerance is not an allergy, and the blood test for Coeliac disease is NOT accurate and often comes back negative, which is why several different tests are needed. None of the Coeliac blood tests I know of check for all of the known antibodies for gluten - some check for 1-4 known gluten antibodies, but not for all of them. Hence why you can have a negative Coeliac test result, but still react in exactly the same way when you have gluten as someone who tests positive for Coeliac disease! As such you will get diagnosed instead as having "non-Coeliac gluten sensitivity" instead. Which in other words really means, you ARE intolerant to gluten, but because of the faulty test, you aren't officially a Coeliac, but you should still avoid all gluten-containing grains.

The next gluten related article will look at whether eating gluten-free foods is helpful for you, or not!

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