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Note from Jim LaValle
Food allergies - what do you know about them? Did you know for example that they
start in the gut (the intestines)?
I find that most people know very little about food allergies and think
that if they had them when they were little they probably grew out of them.
Otherwise they think if no one ever told them they had them, they probably
don't.
But many health conditions are related to food
allergies. For example, did you
know that eczema can be caused by food allergies? Sleep apnea?
Irritable and inflammatory bowel?
Asthma? Hay fever? Yep,
they can all be caused by or made worse by food allergies.
But here's the real shocker. Did you know that food allergies can also contribute to
being overweight? I have been
educating my patients about the role that intestinal health can play in many
health conditions, their weight, and overall health for years, and most were
very skeptical. But seeing is
believing. And research is now
validating this and expanding on our knowledge of how the gut can even affect
our mental health, our joints, autoimmunity and much more.
But until recently few people realized that food allergies
of all types can even contribute to weight gain. If you are a person for who typical dieting measures just
don't seem to work - could food
allergies by the reason?
Read our main article this month to find out how allergies can
contribute to weight gain and what you can do about it.
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Lose Wheat - Lose Weight?
The National Institute of Health has launched an all-out initiative
to explore any and all possible contributors to weight gain, urging researchers
to think outside of the box and explore all paths. For example, insulin resistance is finally being
acknowledged as an underlying cause of weight gain. So anything that can induce insulin resistance can
potentially lead to weight gain.
Recently it was discovered that there are chemicals in the environment
that induce insulin resistance, and they have been acknowledged now as
potential contributors to weight gain and diabetes.
This is a milestone. For years I have been preaching that environmental
chemicals can and are influencing our health - only to have this idea ridiculed
and put down by conventional medicine, saying that it has never been
proven. Well now it has.
How does this tie in with food allergies? The way that some chemicals cause
insulin resistance is that they cause internal inflammation - and that
inflammation damages insulin receptors. Food allergies are also a source of internal
inflammation. The
inflammatory substances put out by our immune cells (as a result of their
reactions to foods) can damage our
insulin receptors and cause insulin resistance. Insulin resistance causes weight gain.
Another mechanism by which food allergies may contribute to
weight gain is that they cause our body to produce more stress hormones, which
can also contribute to insulin resistance. In addition the overproduction of stress hormones can
negatively influence the production of thyroid hormones. And finally food allergies can cause
food cravings, (another factor the NIH urged researchers to explore.)
Keep in mind there are several types of immunoglobulins that
react to foods. The ones that are
typically tested by physicians who specialize in allergies are called IgE immunoglobulins
or antibodies. These are the ones
that create histamine and cause red watery eyes, dripping noses, and
hives. There is another class of
immunoglobulins called IgG. Until
recently it was thought that these immunoglobulins were not a problem. But they have now been linked with
things like eczema, even in adults.
One study looked at IgG antibodies in children and found
that almost 60% of obese children did indeed have much higher levels of IgG
antibodies in their system. They
also had higher C reactive protein levels, a marker of inflammation. [1] This study is one of the first to
raise the idea that IgG food allergies could cause inflammation and contribute
to weight gain and other inflammation-related health problems like plaque build
up in the arteries, which the obese children in the study already had.
In other words, food allergies including IgG reactions
can cause inflammation and that can contribute to weight gain.
So to take it to the next logical step, some researchers
decided to see if testing people for allergies and having them follow their
allergy diets would lead to weight loss. They used 27 obese patients, half male and half
female. The average BMI of the
patients was 32. The study
subjects were all tested for their allergies and went on a diet that eliminated
the foods they were allergic to.
After following their diets for 12 weeks, they lost an average of 35
pounds and a good percentage of the weight lost was body fat[2]. BMI's also came down significantly. So the results were extremely
promising.
Listen, medical news like this can take years to trickle
down into medical education and therefore into medical practice, but there is
absolutely no reason you can't start to look into this issue for yourself. If you have trouble with your weight, I
highly encourage you to explore whether food allergies may be playing a role,
especially if you have any of the other conditions that can be related to food
allergies, like hay fever, sleep apnea, irritable bowel, or eczema.
There are two ways to evaluate whether you have food
allergies. You can either get
tested through a lab or you can try to test it out yourself by doing an
elimination of the common allergenic foods (See list at right.) and
reintroducing them one at a time and watching for symptoms, like headache or
weight gain. If you want to try an
elimination diet rather than getting tested, most registered dietitians would
be able to help you with that. If
you want to have testing done, most integrative medicine practitioners have a
lab they work with to test allergies in their patients. We currently use two labs for food
allergy testing Alletess and Immunolabs.
If you would like to get tested, you can contact our office or refer to
either of these company's websites to find a practitioner in your area. If you prefer to work with an M.D. find
one who tests not just for IgE but also for IgG reactions. Depending on how many foods you are
allergic to, the diets can be pretty challenging to do; once again I highly
recommend seeking out a registered dietitian, who can help you plan some
menus.
To make sure that you don't just develop new food allergies,
it is also important to work with a practitioner who can outline a program to
rebalance gut flora and rebuild intestinal tissue.
As many of you know, I have been specializing for years in
helping people evaluate any and all areas that could be contributing to their
weight problems. I have done this
because I am tired of people being told their weight gain is simply a matter of
calories in and calories burned, and because I feel very sorry for people who
feel like failures because they can't lose weight. There are many hidden causes of weight gain, and food
allergies are one of them.
The bottom line - if weight loss has been
difficult for you, food allergies are just another area to evaluate and see if
they might be an issue for you. I
have had numerous patients for whom allergies played a role in their weight,
and they are so happy when they find that by simply eliminating certain foods
they can finally lose weight, and have a much easier time keeping it off.
[1]
Wilders-Trusching, M. et al.
Anti-food antibodies in obes children. Exp Clin Endocrin Diab
2008;116:241-45.
[2] Akmal, M.
et al. The effect of ALCAT test diet therapry for food sensitivity in patient's
with obesity. Middle East J of Fam
Med 7(3), 2009.
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Greetings!
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