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(08) 6110 0570admin@pdchealthhub.com.auA food allergy involves your immune system and can be life threatening, while a food intolerance involves your gut and does not cause anaphylaxis. That difference decides who tests you and how.
A food allergy is an immune system reaction to a food. It can affect breathing, the heart, the skin or the gut, and the severe form, anaphylaxis, needs adrenaline straight away.1,2 Most food allergy in Australia is triggered by egg, cow's milk, peanut, tree nuts, sesame, soy, wheat, fish and other seafood, although almost any food can do it.2 A food intolerance is different. It involves the gut rather than the immune system, and it does not cause anaphylaxis, apart from sulfite and benzoate reactions.3
Who tests what matters. Skin prick tests and allergen specific IgE blood tests confirm food allergy triggers, and a medically supervised food challenge can confirm or rule one out, with care guided by a doctor or a clinical immunologist.1,2 Those same tests come back negative in intolerance, because there is no IgE to find.3 The Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy lists tests with no credible evidence behind them, including IgG food antibody testing, hair analysis, kinesiology, vega and cytotoxic testing, and warns they lead to harmful treatment and delay.3
This is why self diagnosis costs people. A temporary elimination diet is the only reliable way to test whether diet is a factor in intolerance, and ASCIA says it should be supervised by a dietitian and a medical practitioner, kept short, and followed by controlled reintroduction.3 Long term restriction causes nutritional problems, particularly in children, and dietary avoidance for confirmed food allergy should also be carried out under medical and dietitian supervision so nutrition and growth hold up.2,3 PDC dietitians do not diagnose allergy and do not prescribe adrenaline devices.
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Symptoms are a guide, not a diagnosis. Your GP confirms the diagnosis; our team helps you manage it day to day.
The teams and services that most often support people with this condition. They work from one shared plan, and one GP referral reaches all of them.
This page follows Australian guidance: the Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy on food allergy, food intolerance and first aid for anaphylaxis, together with healthdirect Australia's food allergy information.
A food allergy involves your immune system and can cause anaphylaxis, which is life threatening. An intolerance involves your gut and does not cause anaphylaxis, with the important exception of sulfite and benzoate reactions, which can. Intolerance symptoms are usually uncomfortable rather than dangerous, but that exception is real. How much you eat usually matters in intolerance and often does not in allergy.
No. ASCIA lists IgG food antibody testing, hair analysis, kinesiology, vega testing, pulse testing, ALCAT and cytotoxic testing as inaccurate and unreliable, with no credible evidence behind them, and not rebated. Acting on their results can lead to ineffective or harmful treatment and delays proper management.
Because you can end up avoiding foods you never needed to, and short on nutrients, without ever finding the real trigger. A short supervised elimination with controlled reintroduction gives you an answer you can rely on. Long term restriction causes nutritional problems, particularly in children.
Your doctor, and often a clinical immunologist or allergy specialist. They take the history and arrange skin prick tests, allergen specific IgE blood tests, or a medically supervised food challenge. We do not diagnose allergy and we do not prescribe adrenaline devices.
Our dietitians see children, and nutrition and growth are exactly what we watch during any period of avoidance. Our podiatrists also see children, while PDC physiotherapy sees people aged sixteen and over. For allergy diagnosis your child needs their GP or a clinical immunologist.
Tell us what is going on and we will point you to the right discipline, or to more than one. Most people start with a single appointment and leave with a plan the rest of the team can see.
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