Anaphylaxis- if ur familiar with this, can you please help?

Frumdoc

Tue, May 12 2015, 12:55 pm

amother wrote:

I intentionally omitted the fact that I am a medical professional as well since in this particular area, my knowledge comes from being a mother and not from being an MD. Since you're implying that the issue is my lack of understanding of medical jargon, I am now including that fact.

I have no intention of debating the medical aspect of things since I really do feel it's important for that information to come from the patient's allergist, but I still take issue with some of the information in your post, which is why I will reiterate to anyone here who has a child with food allergies to please seek information only from a board-certified allergist and not from anything you read from anonymous posters on the internet.

PLEASE PM ME TO DISCUSS FURTHER IN PRIVATE.

I will not state my allergy credentials as clearly managment and guidelines differ between countries but I have extensive experience. As I said, I think I am being misunderstood and there is no point in discussing it further as it is clearly confusing people.

I always welcome clinical debate, please let us discuss it further.

amother

Peach

Tue, May 12 2015, 1:47 pm

I've intentionally never outed myself as a physician on this forum and don't intend to now either, even in a PM. In any case, the point of my post was not to debate you regarding the validity of your medical advice. It was just to urge others to get advice only from a board-certified allergist and not from anonymous internet posters. Hopefully I was successful.

Frumdoc

Tue, May 12 2015, 4:23 pm

Thanks for reminding me that no one reads my posts properly. That is exactly what I advised in my very first post, to see an allergist to have a personal diagnosis and management/ treatment plan instead of relying on hatzola to make and treat this very serious diagnosis.

This was exactly my point, I was just making it in a different way, by using the example that all that wheezes is not anaphylaxis. I just feel very frustrated that I have been so misunderstood, I didn't give specific advice to the op other than to see her doctor, and I was trying to explain that she needs a personalised plan, which may be different according to her specific issues and condition.

I apologise for confusing matters in my desire to clarify them.

Remember, don't ever listen or take notice of anything I say - see a doctor!

Frumdoc

Tue, May 12 2015, 4:27 pm

amother wrote:

Shame, I was looking forward to having a rational interaction with a knowledgeable colleague. I wasn't looking to attack you, just genuinely interested. Sorry you don't feel comfortable communicating with me. And I wasn't giving advice other than to see her own doctor....... Rolling Eyes

In any case, everyone knows I am a big fake and just colllecting data about the wierd health beliefs of American Frum jewish women. (This is a joke, Yael knows and has my credentials Rolling Eyes

)

seeker

Tue, May 12 2015, 8:12 pm

As a mom of a child with food allergies, all I want to add is that my prayer is always that the adults responsible for my child will act swiftly and boldly in case of an incident. I cannot contribute medical advice about the potential risks of epi-pens, but allergic reactions can get so scary and can cascade so fast that when in doubt, you have to err on the side of caution. I would rather hear that my kid's teacher administered the Epi-pen but then she was OK after all, than C"V hear the opposite that they were deliberating whether to use it, trying to reach me to get my opinion, waiting to see if it would get better on its own, and then the child stopped breathing or something.

Same goes for calling Hatzolah. Don't say if she knew anything about allergies she could have figured it out. The rule (as I've been told by many a Hatzolah member, and even with all my education about allergies I still don't always feel sure of what I'm seeing or not seeing) is when in doubt, CALL. They will be all too happy to come over and tell you it's nothing.

Also to clarify, from what I was told/read/heard, all the epipen does is buy you time. It freezes the allergic reaction for what could be as little as 15 minutes. The point is to enable you to get to emergency care before it gets worse. It doesn't really fix things. That's one reason why it must always be followed by a trip to ER - in addition to monitoring for side effects. In my experience they followed it with steroids for a couple of days to keep the allergic response inhibited.

Anyway, all the others here are right that you need an allergist who will plan better for your child's care, but I would never second-guess hatzolah members who are doing their best according to their first-aid protocol. If it turns out later that the wheezing was due to something other than anaphylaxis, B"H, very nice, they still did nothing wrong by erring on the side of caution. Consider the alternative.

Love,
Allergic parent with nightmares