Food allergic reactions are abnormal and sometimes violent responses to certain food proteins that are usually well accepted by the rest of the population. Interestingly, there is a higher prevalence of people with food allergies in developed areas than in underdeveloped areas, where there are many more nutritional and hygienic problems.
Another foodborne disease mechanism causing a large number of ailments that were hitherto unrelated to food is the non-allergic food histaminosis syndrome (NAFLD), a very common disease (affecting more than half of the population) and responsible for a wide variety of symptoms.
Histamine is a vital molecule found both in the food we eat (some more than others) and in our cells. HANA occurs when we eat a food to which we are positive, so that our own cells release histamine, leading to different symptoms; this response is called a histamine reaction.
Symptoms of HANA
The symptoms of this disease can be classified into two types:
- Direct: migraines, migraine headaches, abdominal bloating after eating, diarrhea, muscle cramps, dysregulation of secretions (saliva, tears, vaginal discharge), miscarriages and infertility, among others.
- Indirect: intervertebral dehydration, pressure pain, dry skin, constipation, among others.
Diagnosis of HANA
The main problem when making a diagnosis of HANA is that the patient prioritizes his major symptom, whether it is irritable bowel syndrome, migraine or any other, and goes to the corresponding specialist in Clinical Analyses. At this point, it is important for the specialist to make a correct differential diagnosis to distinguish whether or not the patient presents other symptoms that may lead to suspect HANA, such as contractures, intervertebral dehydration, dysregulation of secretions, etc.
To get an idea of the variety of symptoms that HANA can present, our laboratory performs studies on patients referred by specialists who have been treating this type of patients for years. Of all of them, almost half of the patients come from Internal Medicine consultations, where they come for chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia complaints; another percentage from Traumatology consultations, mainly for intervertebral dehydration problems; a small percentage from Digestive System consultations, for symptoms such as irritable bowel syndrome; finally, a smaller percentage come from Neurology, Allergy, Dermatology, Hepatology, Psychiatry, Otolaryngology, among other specialties.
How to approach HANA
As explained above, the natural history of a HANA patient is to go to the corresponding specialist for one or more symptoms that concern them and, as a general rule, the specialist will offer a treatment to calm the symptoms. In this way, the patient takes more and more drugs to treat the various ailments, which can lead to over-consumption. This is not only not the solution, but rather aggravates the problem, since the drugs are incorporated in the digestive tract and this leads to the deterioration of the digestive tract.
For this reason it is important for specialist physicians to be knowledgeable about HANA, to make more laborious consultations and to be more available to the patient. In this way, they will be able to diagnose the disease and the patient will be able to confirm through an analytical study which foods are responsible. In addition, this will help to reduce the excessive consumption of drugs.
On the other hand, the patient must be aware that the treatment requires an effort on his part and that he has to be very constant, since it is more difficult to avoid dairy products, which can also be found in sausages, meat, pasta, etc., than to take three pills a day, for example. It should be noted that the greater the number of foods, the more complicated the diet, and currently the food supply has too many components.
Despite its difficulty, it has been demonstrated that the therapeutic diet is the most effective solution in the treatment of HANA. Specifically, 92% of patients improve with this method, some patients need an extension of other food series and only a small percentage need special studies.
In summary, foods, which are a source of health, for different reasons and even in good condition, can lead to disease. Thus, the following points should be highlighted:
- All foods, in greater or lesser proportion, contain histamine, but the histamine content of foods never lead us to chronic disease, so making diets of foods low in histamine, under our point of view, are inadvisable. There are many points on which we can rely to defend this statement.
- The cause of the disease lies exclusively in the histamine released by our own cells when we eat a food that, for the affected person, behaves as positive in a specific histamine release test.
- Non-allergic food histaminosis (NAFLD) is an acquired disease and, when things are done right over a period of time, foods removed from the diet can be reintroduced.