‘My peanut allergy nearly killed me

Chris Brookes-Smith, 28, used to live with fear of dying when eating even the smallest peanut trail.

Ten years ago he had his allergic sausage reaction after ordering a curry at a local Indian meal. The trauma of it is chamuscated in your memory.

“I knew I was in trouble after a bite,” he says. “In a matter of seconds there were points on my lips. In a matter of minutes I was vomiting. I could feel that my throat was closed, the hives forming in my armpits and then especially my body … my face swells with swelling.”

His voice takes away, full of emotion.

“I thought I was going to that.”

Photo tasks in the hospital later show the toll the touch of reaction in your body.

“It looked like a turned turkey because my skin had talled a lot,” says Chris.

But the most painful were the hives: red and lifted protuberances in the skin, which felt “as if the boiling water had poured on me.”

Trying to avoid peanuts, one of the most common food allergies, has a leg life for Chris and millions of other adults with severe allergy. Eating outside, going to social events and traveling abroad are full of anxiety.

Up to one in 200 adults and one in 50 children have an allergy to nuts, beneficial organizations say. Some children grow up from their allergies, but many do not, and continue until adulthood or get worse.

An allergic reaction occurs when the body reacts to the protein in the peanuts, thinking that it is a threat, which triggers a release of chemicals. Symptoms can vary from soft to very serious.

Chris’s allergy came to light for the first time like a baby, when he developed an eruption while his mother made peanut butter sandwiches.

Each reaction since then has been worse than the previous one, which means that it has become a battery to live every day “on maximum alert with the hope that nothing bad happens.”

Activities such as going out with friends or eating in restaurants, which must be pleasant, become stressful and enhanced experiences of life.

Despite the love for trips, Chris avoided going to countries where peanuts are commonly used, such as Southeast Asia, after three allergic reactions on a trip to Italy.

As Chris grew up, his family constantly worried about him. But then his mother heard about a clinical trial in Guy’s and St Thomas’ Nhs Foundation Trust and King’s College London that would change his son’s life.

I would try white adults like Chris with serious peanut allergies could be sensitized when training their bodies to tolerate the same ones that could kill him, calming the immune system when he would usually use excessively react.

Despite being “really nervous,” Chris agreed to register.

Under the attentive eye of the doctors, Chris began eating a fraction of a milligram or peanut powder mixed with yogurt. Approximately many months, the amount of peanuts gradually increased, slowly building Chris eating nuts of nuts and finally, whole nuts.

At the end of the nine -month studio, 14 of the 21 patients could eat the five -peanut equivalent without having allergic reactions, including Chris.

Professor Stephen Till, who directed the research, says that the treatment “has the potential to have a real impact on the lives of patients.”

“The most severe reactions occur due to errors, usually by another person, and the lack of communication. Therefore, it provides some protection against that.

“They have tasks that control, if you want, or their peanut allergy now.”

The method, called oral immunotherapy, has already been shown that it works for allergies to pollen, wasp and bees bites. It is only one leg used in food allergies in the last 20 years, and mainly in children whose immune systems are still developing. It is believed that allergies to adults are more difficult to change.

“Peanut allergy is very common in children and almost never disappears,” says the teacher. “These young people will become adults, so we also need adult treatments.”

This essay, published in Allergy magazine, shows that adults with serious allergies can increase the amount of peanuts they can tolerate in 100 times.

Chris had no idea how he would react to the slightest trail of peanuts. Increasing that dose, voluntarily, every day was something I could not imagine.

“The first time I got there and I struck these things, my heart goes a million miles per hour,” he says. “The great leap in fear was to move from peanut dust to half of a complete use.”

But he calmed down for having a team of doctors and nurses present, with drugs such as an adrenaline that is maintained in case of a severe and for life reaction.

“You have 100 eyes in you, nothing will happen.”

However, experts stress that no one should try at home on their own due to the risk of a severe allergic reaction.

Not all who tested the treatment were navigated, and the largest essays in more people will have to find out why it is.

“For some people, there were reactions and we had to reduce the speed or return a step,” explains the teacher. “But the message is that it can densibilize adults to peanuts, and should focus more on adults in the future.”

Being able to eat peanuts safely had a great impact on the lives of those who participated, the researchers say. He has given them freedom to travel, reduced their anxiety when eating outside and eliminated their fear of food.

How to develop this in a practical treatment in NHS is more a challenge. First, larger tests are needed to prove that it can work for more people.

And researchers are analyzing whether to put peanut drops under the language could be a safer way to achieve the same final result.

Chris now eats four peanuts every morning with his breakfast granola to keep his allergy at bay, as achieved by his doctors.

He is grateful for having had the opportunity to participate in the trial and hopes that many others with serious peanut allergies can also benefit from treatment.

While he admits that he still hates the flavor of peanuts, he says that he can eat something that is our body in “nuclear collapse” has changed his life.

“It’s a wonderful feeling,” says Chris. “I’m no longer afraid to die.”