Healthy Living responds well to allergy reactions

Allergic reactions can be mild or dangerous. Sudden, severe, widespread reactions require emergency evaluation by a medical professional. Healthy Living takes a look at the best way to respond to an allergy reaction.

Marleni Cuellar, Reporting

It’s difficult to pinpoint why; but the body can be very temperamental. It reacts accordingly in some situations and ‘acts out’ with very little reason. One classic example is when the body has a hypersensitive reaction to a foreign substance. This is commonly known as an allergic reaction.

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo, Internist/Intensivist

“We need to say that an allergic reaction is the normal response of the body to an estranged substance that the body is recognizing.”

Internist & Intensivist, Dr Jorge Hidalgo explains why an allergic reaction is not something to be taken lightly.

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo

“The allergic reaction is something that can presented from a minute to an hour like for example if you having a reaction to a medication then probably it start day by day and you notice a little rash and then you say okay maybe it’s a reaction to a medication. But we can have the other scenario that probably start with a medication and you can have a severe reaction with rashes in the skin and you can collapse or the most dangerous part is you can have a compromise of your airway and you can die.”

The duration and the implication of a reaction are dependent on the type of the allergy and most importantly what triggers it.

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo

“Those people that are prone from allergies they are known already to allergy tendencies and also there are other people that probably went to see the doctor and start with a medication and they react to that medication. We have the common triggers from allergies; the nuts, the food allergies, could be an insect sting and also could be the reaction of an intravenous injection. The allergic reactions have many, many symptoms. Sometimes it could be hives, rashes in the skin, the skin can be swollen, itching until the most dangerous one that is basically a compromise to the airway and the patient can die from that.”

But how does this type of reaction become life threatening? Dr Hidalgo explains.

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo

“We can say we have skin symptoms, we can have respiratory symptoms, obviously we can have a sore throat and we start to notice that the air exchange is compromised and we have difficulty breathing, we start to hear some wheezing in our lungs and also you can feel like the heart is pumping very, very fast, we can have heart palpitations and our blood pressure can be very low and we can have an aphylactic shock and then we can start to lose consciousness and collapse. Basically, you can see the swelling of the skin you can see the airway the tissue of the airway become swelling and closes the airways and the patients die basically from suffocation or asphyxiation.”

So what is the best recommendation for persons who frequently experience allergy reactions?

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo

“If you know that you’re a patient with allergies, there are things that we can do. One: if you’re one to be in a situation where you want to expose yourself, first of all, try to avoid the triggers. But in any case if it’s an avoidable situation and you know you have allergies you can look for advice from your family doctor and see if he can teach you how to use the self injection of epinephrine. That is one of the things that you can carry with you if you have already the tendency to have allergies.”

As for at home remedies, Dr. Hidalgo gives advice for allergy reactions that are not severe.

Dr. Jorge Hidalgo

“If it’s something that is an allergic reaction that is developing and it’s not a life threatening reaction and you have enough time to get to a medical facility then probably you can start taking Benadryl at home and other medication that  probably could get over the counter.”

The final point to be reiterated when it comes to allergic reactions is that if you know your allergy and know the triggers your best tip is to avoid them all together.