Episode Transcript
Interviewer: What are the symptoms of food allergies? We'll examine that next on The Scope.
Announcer: This is "From the Frontlines" with emergency room physician Dr. Troy Madsen on The Scope. On The Scope.
Interviewer: If you're listening to this right now, you probably suspect you might have a food allergy and you're curious to know for sure if that could be the case. Probably have a lot of questions and so do I so we're going to talk to Dr. Troy Madsen. He's an emergency room physician at University of Utah Health Care. So symptoms of food allergies, how do I know if I have a food allergy? What are some of the common symptoms? And there's a difference between food allergies and food sensitivities?
Dr. Madsen: Exactly, yeah and that's often a point of confusion, but allergies are like any other kind of allergy. If you have a food allergy, it can range from mild, so maybe some itching, little bit of a rash; to more severe, where you have some throat tightness, some lip tingling, to really severe cases where you just can't breathe. So those are what we think of with allergies.
Interviewer: With food allergies. And is it possible for me to just be minding my business, I'm eating something I've eaten my whole life and now, all of a sudden, my throat's swollen, like I've reacted that quickly and that severely?
Dr. Madsen: It is possible and, surprisingly, it's not uncommon. People I've known who have had eaten shellfish for years and then sometime in adulthood, eat some lobster or some shrimp, and just suddenly develop itching and facial swelling and trouble breathing. So it's entirely possible. You could've eaten this food for years and then, later in life, develop a food allergy.
Interviewer: All right. And if you start having these symptoms, what should you do?
Dr. Madsen: If they're mild symptoms, like a rash, maybe just a little bit of itching, you're probably okay just to take some Benadryl. But if it's more severe, anything that involves the airway, any lip swelling, tongue swelling, throat tightness, trouble breathing, that's where I would even call 911. I mean, you've got to get to the ER because those things can develop really quickly and be life-threatening, just very, very severe reactions.
Interviewer: So those symptoms again, lip swelling, tongue swelling, tingling?
Dr. Madsen: Tingling, I would get to the ER and, again, if you're . . . any concerns about your airway, call 911.
Interviewer: All right. Don't mess around with that.
Dr. Madsen: Exactly.
Interviewer: I feel like we only talked for a few seconds here about this topic. Have we covered it all? Is that pretty much it?
Dr. Madsen: Well, like you mentioned, there's also the issue with food sensitivity versus allergies. So again there, we're talking about very different things, some people may have concerns about gluten or other things in foods. There, they may have some more abdominal cramping, maybe some nausea, diarrhea. That's not a true allergy. Again, the allergies are the things we think of with any sort of allergy: itching, rashes, airway issues, much more concerning in terms of getting to the ER.
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