Dog allergies

CaveDweller

CaveDweller

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Paul
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For the past four years my eldest boy who's four has developed a constant runny nose. Doctors and all sorts of different departments at the hospital have not come to a conclusion why. It was only today that his speech therapist mentioned it might be our dogs.

I know there are tests you can get done to see if you're allergic to dogs or not, but is there a test out there that can be done to actually find out what dog? For example I have two Border Collies, a long haired and a medium haired one and he could be allergic to one and not the other.

Either way I'm going to ring the doctors tomorrow and find out, but I'm curious now...and they're closed:rolleyes::D
 
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Could also be house dust, mould and so on.
I think that when trying to track down the cause of an allergy it is necessary to start by testing the person with the symptoms to find what they are allergic too.

Even if only one dog is producing the allergen it will probably be on both dogs if they interact or occupy the same places. Therefore, in practice, both dogs would trigger the reaction. By the same token, anyone who touches the dogs (or other source of the allergen) or where they have been could spread the allergen to the boy.

I suspect that you'll struggle to get to the bottom of the problem.
 
There are a variety of allergy tests available, from the arm test where various items are put on patches on your arm to see which one reacts to breathing apparatus tests, which are extreme, where the person being tested is put in a room with various items to see which sets them off. The breathing test is good for animal testing as you would introduce one animal at a time until the symptoms occur. I've had two arm tests so far and still haven't worked out what sets me off (tried 20 items at a time) but I'm sure I'll find out eventually. Push for your doctor to find what tests are available on the NHS, some are only available privately, and hopefully you'll get an answer. Have you tried using antihistamines over long periods to help build up your boys immunity, that's probably the easiest way but you still don't find the actual cause of the allergy.
 
I think it would be unusual to be allergic to just one breed of dog. More likely to be all dogs that shed hair.
If your doctor's not willing to test, there are private allergy clinics out there.
Good luck in your investigations!
 
Thanks all. I'm at work now (yes I'm slacking) but my wife is going to speak to the doctors today. I think they will just put him on antihistamines for a while first to see if it makes a difference.
 
I hope you get it sorted Paul. I was allergic to dogs as a child, but grew out of it quite quickly, so hopefully (if that is indeed the cause of the issue) your lad will too.
 
Nikon_Nick said:
I hope you get it sorted Paul. I was allergic to dogs as a child, but grew out of it quite quickly, so hopefully (if that is indeed the cause of the issue) your lad will too.
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Glad you outgrew it Nick.
Are you a dog owner now, or just happy not to sneeze your bonce off around other people's pooches? :-)
 
Which dog did you get 2 years ago? If they've always been there then I'd be surprised if the child was allergic to dogs. Especially if neither parent has allergies to them.
 
viv1969 said:
Glad you outgrew it Nick.
Are you a dog owner now, or just happy not to sneeze your bonce off around other people's pooches? :)
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Thanks Ruth. Yes, we have a rottie, so nice short hair, but I dont have any issues around longer haired dogs either(y)
 
Nikon_Nick said:
Thanks Ruth. Yes, we have a rottie, so nice short hair, but I dont have any issues around longer haired dogs either(y)
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Nice one. Rotties are great!
 
srichards said:
Which dog did you get 2 years ago? If they've always been there then I'd be surprised if the child was allergic to dogs. Especially if neither parent has allergies to them.
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I got Shep, my Sable coloured collie two years ago at 8 weeks old. I've had Shadow, the black and white one for 7 years. Now that I think about it though it's been longer than 2years my boy has had a runny nose so I don't see Shep being the problem. Before I got Shep at 8 weeks I had another collie but he had to get put down, so my boy has always been around more than one dog.

I'll just have to see what tests we can get done. My boy was fine when he had his adenoids out, his nose didn't run at all. After a few months though it's come back so I'm unsure of it being an allergic reaction. He has all sorts of problems including being partially deaf and knee problems. He's also getting tested for autism so it's non stop with him lol. My other boy who turned 3 yesterday is completely fine and neither me or my wife has any allergies.

Edit: I remember him being a very snotty baby as well. The doctors thought he had asthma to start with so they gave him a course of inhalers. That ran on for a while till we managed to get him in for more checks and found out all his other problems.
 
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He might just be a snotty kid in general then!

Dairy can do that to some people. Could be an interesting test to switch to non dairy like soya with him for a while and see whether that de-snots him...
 
I'm allergic to dairy produce, BUT it manifests itself in a strange way, it's more of an intolerance than a massive reaction. It comes on like hay fever and certain anti hay fever pills work, alternatively I have a steroid nasal spray.
The odd thing is though I can tolerate a certain amount without any reaction at all, then after a small amount more of the allergen (it can be dairy, milk chocolate even a dusty atmosphere e.g. a pub when they allowed smoking inside or similar) and the reaction can be rapid or kick in days later but usually quite intense. I wonder if your boy has a similar thing. The skin test were useless and we found out by process of elimination really, took a fair while. Sorry, I cant be a lot more positive but I think it may be a long slog to discover the cause, at the time my Mum thought it was our cat that was the problem (I was 15 then, 44 years ago) but refused to do the food tests the hospital advised, discovered it some 20 years later whne the wife decided she'd put up with my semi constant nose problem.
At least people are more aware nowdays.
Matt
 
Sorry to thread hijack but you mentioned speech therapy. My son (2 yrs 9 months) has been waiting on a referral since November and it doesn't look like he'll get an appointment any time soon. Just wondering what sort of thing they do at speech therapy so that I can try their techniques at home?

We use books, toys and flash cards to try and encourage him. His referral letter was sent after his 30 month check, done at 29 months. He only had roughly 24 words rather than the 50 the health visitor wanted him to use. I think he's improving a lot now but still only using single words rather than any kind of sentence. I want to give him as much encouragement as possible while we wait for our first appointment. He seems to prefer sounds to words. For example ask him what the pig is and he'll say oink oink. Randomly he knows what a shark is though. I'd say he's around the 50 word mark now so i'm not overly concerned.
 
Julie1979 said:
Sorry to thread hijack but you mentioned speech therapy. My son (2 yrs 9 months) has been waiting on a referral since November and it doesn't look like he'll get an appointment any time soon. Just wondering what sort of thing they do at speech therapy so that I can try their techniques at home?

We use books, toys and flash cards to try and encourage him. His referral letter was sent after his 30 month check, done at 29 months. He only had roughly 24 words rather than the 50 the health visitor wanted him to use. I think he's improving a lot now but still only using single words rather than any kind of sentence. I want to give him as much encouragement as possible while we wait for our first appointment. He seems to prefer sounds to words. For example ask him what the pig is and he'll say oink oink. Randomly he knows what a shark is though. I'd say he's around the 50 word mark now so i'm not overly concerned.
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I've never been to any sessions myself with work going on, but I get filled in by the wife. That's basically what they cover in their sessions though. It also depends on how exactly they are struggling with their speech. My boy was struggling saying a word as a whole to start with so they got him to emphasise the end of each word more. We had to exaggerate everything we said so he got it in his head. He finally got some words nailed but now he's struggling with sentences. He's coming on well now though with leaps and bounds. they also helped him with some sign language with being partially deaf, but they seem to have stopped that now since his speech is coming along so well.

If you have an Ipad or some sort of tablet there's a variety of kids games available for free that helps them learn. I have an Ipad but it's been taken over with kids games and my two kids love it. My youngest boy who's 3 will sit there and play away whilst speaking along with the games. I don't like them using it for long periods of time though, it's more of a treat once a day for a short period. I don't want them sitting there playing games all day lol.

I wouldn't worry too much about your boy, he's still young and he'll soon catch on. By the sounds of it he can say more than my eldest boy could at his age.
 
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Thanks Phil, that's really useful. Tbh, I wasn't overly concerned because he was speaking at the same level as his male friends of a similar age but his health visitor took a real issue to it. We had a huge personality clash.

He does have a hudl that he plays flash card and puzzle style games on.

I suspected it was related to his ears as he swims a lot but the HV refused to refer him for a hearing test. He's not been swimming for about 6 weeks and this is the period i've noticed him really start to pick up.
 
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