Food Sensitivity Test Kit or a Practitioner: Which Is Worth It?

If you keep reacting to foods, a food and symptom diary and a guided elimination diet will tell you more than an at-home test kit. Most kits sold as food sensitivity tests measure IgG antibodies. The American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology says this test “has never been scientifically proven to be able to accomplish what it reports to do,” and recommends against using it to diagnose food allergies, intolerances or sensitivities.¹

Before either one, see your doctor. Some reactions to food are allergies, and those need an allergist.

What the kits measure

An IgG food panel reports antibody levels to “usually 90 to 100 foods” from one blood sample, and suggests removing the foods that score high.¹ The difficulty is what a high score means. According to the Academy, “the presence of IgG is likely a normal response of the immune system to exposure to food,” and higher levels “may simply be associated with tolerance to those foods.”¹

If IgG reflects exposure, a high score can simply mean a food you eat often. A long list of foods to avoid can follow from a result that only shows what has been on your plate.

The National Health Service in England says the same about tests sold to the public: some “are not recommended,” because “there’s limited evidence that they give accurate results.”²

Allergy, intolerance and sensitivity are different things

• A food allergy is an immune system reaction, and it can be serious. A reaction that comes on fast, or involves your skin, lips, throat or breathing, needs medical care. An allergist diagnoses and manages food allergies.¹
• A food intolerance is “when you have difficulty digesting certain foods or ingredients in food.” It is not caused by the immune system overreacting.² Symptoms usually come on a few hours after eating and commonly include bloating, gas, stomach pain and diarrhea.²
• “Food sensitivity” is used loosely for reactions that fit neither description neatly. It is a description of an experience, not a diagnosis.

What tells you more than a kit

1. A food and symptom diary. Writing down what you eat and how you feel is one of the tools the NHS describes for working out triggers.² A few weeks of entries can show patterns: a food, a time of day, a meal eaten in a rush.
2. A guided elimination. You avoid the suspected food for a set time to see whether symptoms improve, then bring it back to confirm.² One or two foods at a time, not twenty.
3. Advice before you cut. The NHS warns against cutting foods out “without the advice of a GP or food and nutrition specialist (dietitian),” because of the vitamins and minerals you can miss.²

Who to see, in order

1. Your doctor, for symptoms that keep coming back, and to rule out conditions that need treatment.
2. An allergist, if a reaction is fast, involves skin, swelling or breathing, or has ever frightened you.
3. A dietitian or nutrition practitioner, to run the diary and the elimination with you, and to plan the way back to a wider diet.

If you already have kit results

Don’t throw them out, and don’t rebuild your diet around them. Take them to your doctor or practitioner as one piece of information. If you have already removed many foods and feel no better, that is useful to know: the answer is probably not on the list.

When the list of foods keeps growing

Reacting to more and more foods is a pattern worth looking at as a whole. Removing each new food in turn narrows the diet without settling the reactions. Maria’s view of that pattern, and of what can widen a diet again, is in Low-Grade Inflammation: The Quiet Fire.

Working with Maria

Maria Zilka is a nutritional therapy practitioner in Beaverton, Oregon, seeing clients in person and by secure video. She does not diagnose allergies or intolerances. She works with a food and stress log, short and purposeful elimination, and a plan for bringing foods back, alongside your medical care. Read more about inflammation and food sensitivities, or request an appointment.

Sources

1. American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, “The Myth of IgG Food Panel Testing”. aaaai.org
2. National Health Service (England), “Food intolerance”. nhs.uk

Maria Zilka, NTP
Maria has practiced nutritional therapy for more than fifteen years. Her work centers on the nervous system, digestion and chronic inflammation. She sees clients in person in Beaverton, Oregon, and by secure video. More about Maria