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Allergies
 This year more than 50 million Americans will sniffle, wheeze, cough, or scratch their way through a bout of allergies.
Some suffer from short-lived seasonal allergies, while others suffer all year long-usually in response to foods, pets, or the dust mites that take residence in all of our mattresses and pillows. An unlucky few will suffer from a combination of the two. We'll discuss who gets allergies, how to know for sure when it's allergies, and the rare occasions when they can be life threatening.
Allergy How's and Why's ...An allergy occurs when your body sees an ordinary substance as foreign, and the immune system tries to combat the substance. Certain chemicals in the body are released in response to the substance, and these chemicals actually cause the release of other chemicals, which cause symptoms like itchy eyes, runny nose, post-nasal drip, itchy ears and in some cases, even asthma. The foreign substance could be tree pollen, grass, ragweed, cat, dust, a certain food allergy, or any number of other ordinary substances that the body somehow identifies as foreign. The AAFA classifies the other type of allergy a chronic, or 'perennial' allergy, which means it can occur all year. Mold allergies, dust mite allergies and pet allergy are all perennial allergies, because the sufferer can be exposed all year long. Allergic and Don't Know It?Strong possibility there. People can walk around with what they think are cold symptoms and sinusitis for five years and just assume it's a cold. Then someone might say to them, "Maybe this is an indoor allergy." And they go and they get tested and, lo and behold, they have dust mite allergy. So it is certainly possible. If you or someone you know is having repeated symptoms, then it's time to go see a doctor. Nobody should be walking around with a cold for four weeks. How can you tell?If you're having the same symptoms every fall, chances are that you're not just getting a cold every fall and most likely have a winter allergy. There's a good chance that it's due to ragweed and weed allergy. If you're waking up every morning and you feel congested and swollen, chances are it's an allergy to the dust mites that live in the bed. If every time you're exposed to a cat you start to feel a little short of breath or have itchy eyes or a runny nose, then chances are you're allergic to your pet. A primary-care physician can determine that someone has an allergy based on the symptoms and the scenario. But I think most primary-care physicians would refer patients to an allergist to fine-tune the treatment.
Drew Voight
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