A food allergy doesn’t follow a specific timeline; you can have a food allergy at any time in your life. Yes, adults can develop food allergies too.
Although food allergies occur most often in infants and children, they can appear at any age and can be caused by foods that had been previously eaten without any problems. Finally, excessive exposure to a particular food may affect the overall rate of allergy to that food, as testified by the high prevalence of fish allergy among Scandinavians and of rice allergy among the Japanese.
The prime reason some people have allergies and others don’t deals with the matter of heredity. We are products of our parents, so in that gene pool, if our parents had allergies on both sides of the family, chances are we will have allergies too. If our relatives had allergies, we still have a good chance of having them passed on to us.
Once the food allergy has been confirmed, the most effective means of dealing with the food allergy is by the process of elimination. The patient should not eat the offending food in any form. The patient must be watchful and check labels on food products and learn other names of identifying the responsible food or food additive to make certain it is not present.
When eating in a restaurant, be particularly careful and take emergency medicines with you if you have a history of severe reactions. Waiters aren’t always aware of the exact ingredients of each item on the menu.
In some cases of adult food allergies, strict adherence to an elimination diet appears to promote the process of outgrowing the food allergy. The vast majority of patients with documented allergic reactions to eggs, cow’s milk, and soy eventually become tolerant to these foods. Allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, fish and shellfish, however last a lifetime and are not outgrown.
One-third of children and adults will eventually be free from their allergic reactions to foods after carefully following the strict diets free of the offending food allergens.
After six months of being free from those foods that created your allergic reactions, your doctor may recommend that you undergo an oral food challenge under close observation to reassess your allergy symptoms. If you don’t have a reaction, then you will be able to reintroduce the food into your diet. If any symptoms do occur, the dietary restriction should remain in tact.