What is an allergy?
An allergy is the body's over-response to something that would normally be considered harmless. The body can respond in many ways and often people are not aware that they have allergies.

The term allergen (or antigen ) is used to describe the substance that is causing the allergy. Common allergens are: house dust, mites, molds, animal dander, grass, tree or weed pollens, food, drugs, dyes, perfumes, and volatile chemicals.

When a susceptible person is exposed by inhalation, ingestion, or skin contact to these allergens, they can experience sinus or nasal congestion, headaches, watery or itchy eyes and nose, sneezing, cough, skin rashes or asthma. They may also suffer depression, fatigue, palpitations, hyperactivity, blood sugar problems, hypertension, joint pains, digestive problems and other symptoms. It is also possible to be allergic to many things and have vague symptoms.

“Rain Barrel” theory of allergy
Try to envision your body as a rain barrel. Your body deals with many stressors (allergens, sensitivities, stress) without giving you any symptoms until it is overburdened. Then, like a full rain barrel, as more water (stressors) pours in, it spills over. You may begin to notice symptoms when the body is overburdened like the water spilling over the rain barrel.

For example, you may have some dust and mite allergies and your body (rain barrel) will contain (handle this stress) these and you notice no symptoms. On top of this you may have some mold allergy, food allergy, sensitivity to chemicals and perhaps even job or home stress—again, the rain barrel contains these but starts to fill.

Along comes the tree pollens in the spring or fall, and it fills the rain barrel to the top and it begins to spill over. You may think, “boy, these trees are really bothering me!” However, it isn't just the trees, it is everything in the rain barrel.

Allergy treatment cannot begin to treat every stress in and throughout your body, but it can reduce some of them and lower the level in the rain barrel. Our goal is to neutralize some of your allergies with treatment and therefore reduce the load your body has to deal with. Reducing this load should decrease or eliminate your symptoms, and may enable you to decrease reliance on prescription medications.

How do we test for allergies at The Marino Center?
The type of allergy testing we do here is intradermal skin testing. We test year round allergens (dust, mite, mold, animal danders) and pollens (trees, grasses, weeds). Intradermal testing consists of injecting a drop of liquid extract into the skin to produce a small wheal (about the size of a mosquito bite). Enlargement of this wheal after 10 minutes is considered a positive reaction. When a reaction occurs, we do further incremental injections with lower concentrations of allergen until we find a negative reaction,which is the basis of beginning treatment.

How do we treat allergies?

Once an allergic reaction is confirmed, we will be able to treat you with multiple options including injections. The treatment is individualized and based on your allergy tests and preferences for treatment modality.

It is important to note that the treatment you receive from us will work best in conjunction with environmental and dietary changes. Some examples are: avoiding suspected food allergens, sugar, and processed foods; cleaning your environment, using an air filter; getting regular exercise, and taking nutritional supplements such as Vitamin C, B complex, magnesium, essential fatty acids, or quercetin. Nutritional supplementation should be coordinated and reviewed with your physician or nutritionist.

Conventional treatments for allergy symptoms such as antihistamines, nasal steroid sprays and various inhalers may also be used as necessary.

ALLERGY INSTRUCTIONS, IN PREPARATION FOR YOUR SKIN TEST