Drugs, procedures ease all types of allergies
Allergy sufferers can be tissue free with prescriptions, over-the-counter drugs and operations
Jaleesha Petty
Issue date: 6/4/09 Section: Feature
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There are many known allergies: hay fever, atopic dermatitis (eczema), food allergy, insect sting, and drug allergens. The most common food and insect allergies can trigger a severe reaction known as anaphylaxis causing the body to go into shock.
"My asthma was so severe that I was the little girl in the plastic bubble in the hospital a lot," Maritza Baida, Pierce College advisor said.
Baida is one of the million who suffered from severe asthma as a child due to the environment surrounding her. As a childhood resident of Long Beach, Calif., Baida developed severe asthma from the smog in that region.
"I still had allergic attack and then the doctor told me I should live in a place with less smog," Baida said.
As Baida got older, her allergy came only from cats and pollen. Moving from Long Beach to Santa Barbara made a big difference. Although she still had a runny nose and itchy red eyes, her asthma was no longer an issue.
"Santa Barbara had westerly and easterly winds that would congregate," Baida Said. "We all had allergy attacks from pollen."
When Baida moved to Tacoma, she suffered another bad attack to later discover she was allergic to birch and alder trees. She began doing allergy shots to boost her immunity to allergens.
"I was instructed to clean and dust my room once a week and wash my sheets without fabric softener," Baida said.
Shortly following the shots, she began Rapid Immunotherapy, which required three shots in each arm every 45 minutes for eight hours for two days. She also was prescribed heavy allergy medicine that consisted of steroids so she did no go into anaphylactic shock.
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