Milk allergies occur because the immune system mistakenly sees milk protein as something that is dangerous for the body and tries to fight it off. It starts as an allergic reaction causing a child to be fussy and irritable along with an upset stomach and other symptoms. Breastfeeding lowers the risk of the child developing a milk allergy. In many cases however, the allergy is said to be genetic. Normally, by the time a child reaches the age of three to five years old, the allergy goes away all on its own.

People who have milk allergies should really pay good attention to what they are eating because a lot of foods nowadays are made up of milk and other milk products. A milk allergy is different from lactose intolerance and without extra caution, a milk allergy may turn into a severe illness due to direct contact with foods that cause it.

Milk Allergy And The Immune System

A person who has a milk allergy reacts to the proteins in the milk. The substance known as Curd which forms the chunks that can be observed in sour milk contains 80% of the milk’s proteins while Whey which is the watery part holds 20% of the milk’s content.If a person who has allergic reactions to milk eats food that contain milk products, the immune system will fight the milk proteins because it mistakenly sees them as invaders thus harmful to the body. The immune system protects the body from these milk proteins by creating antibodies known as immunoglobulin that trigger the release of chemicals into the body such as histamine.

The release of these chemicals affect the different parts of the body such as the gastrointestinal tract, the skin, the respiratory system and the cardiovascular system which then causes the allergy symptoms like nausea, headache, wheezing, itchy hives and stomachache.

The Common Symptoms

Just like any other food allergy reactions, the symptoms occur within ten minutes to a couple of hours after eating the food that caused the allergy. The symptoms may sometimes last for less than a day affecting any of these three body systems: the skin, the gastrointestinal tract and the respiratory tract.

Symptoms of milk allergy are red rashes, redness and swelling in the areas of the mouth or eczema in skin. The gastrointestinal tract on the other hand is affected in the form of belly cramps, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. The respiratory tract has symptoms ranging from itchy and watery eyes, runny nose and sneezing to asthma attacks coupled with wheezing and coughing.

A severe reaction known as anaphylaxis may also occur to some patients. It causes the swelling of the mouth as well as the throat and airways that lead to the lungs leading to the inability of the patient to breathe. There is also a dangerous drop in the blood pressure which cause the dizziness and passing out and sometimes immediately lead to shock.

Going To The Doctor

Once your doctor suspects that you might be having a milk allergy, you will be referred to a specialist that is equipped to better treat your allergic reactions. The allergy specialist will then ask you some questions that may cover information about how often these reactions occur and the time that it usually takes before the allergy manifests itself in your system. He or she will also ask you if there are members of your family who has the same case of allergic reactions that you have.

An allergy specialist performs a skin test on you and this test will involve a placing of liquid extracts of milk protein on the patient’s forearm or back. The skin will be pricked a bit and the allergist waits if there would appear reddish spot forms thus indicating the allergic reaction.

Tags: cardiovascular system, body systems, allergy specialist, Immune System, Milk Allergy, Health, milk protein, milk proteins

Best Exercises For Knee arthritis

While you may be worried about what the various factors are that cause knee arthritis, it may come as a complete surprise to you to learn that running is not a main risk factor in spite of the fact that medical opinion on the subject is almost evenly divided between those who think it does affect your knee arthritis and those who think it does not. Furthermore, there are even some studies that suggest that if a person keeps his or her mileage to below thirty miles, then the risk of contracting knee arthritis is not very high.

Elliptical Trainer

Such studies obviously raise the question as to what are the best exercises to treat knee arthritis, are, and in this regard aerobic exercises could play an important role for treating the condition. In order to get the best results from your complete exercise program it would be a smart idea for any patient that has knee arthritis to use the following training program, aerobics would be the best to start off woith then moving on to stretching and strengthening. You could also choose an elliptical trainer for your knee arthritis and they are generally available in fitness clubs and also can be purchased for home use.

The advantage to using an elliptical trainer for your knee arthritis is that it allows you to move in a way that lies in between the movement of a bike and that of a stairclimber. The idea is low impact exercise, you may put your feet on the pedals until you reach a nice steady elliptical motion that does not create any impact on your knees, which will also workout to be much better for your cardiovascular system also.

If you like the water, then you can choose to swim in order to improve your knee arthritis, as this exercise too will give you a good cardiovascular workout and it is also not an impact activity. In any case it might not be the ideal situation if you have any type of shoulder injury as some types of strokes may cause your shoulder issue to become much more intense. Nevertheless, for knee arthritis it makes for an excellent choice and you should go ahead and swim without fear of any repercussions.

The stationary bike would make another nice consideration for yourself, the bike is perfect for aerobic type conditioning and is also a very low impact exercise, make sure that when you first start out that the tension on the bike is low as you want to feel it out to see just what you are able to stand. You can also use it for stretching the hamstring as well as for quad strengthening.

When you are dealing with knee arthritis it would behoove you to "NOT" use a treadmill, the reason fro this is that this type of exercise can put a lot of impact on your knee which in turn can make your condition of the knee far more worse if you were to continue using it. You should be able to deal with your arthritis issue as long as you remember these exercises and also keeping in mind the other activities.

Tags: cardiovascular system, impact activity, shoulder injury, exercise program, knee arthritis