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Time Required

            I usually spend one hour with new patients.  During this time I will obtain a complete environmental history and perform a relevant physical exam. You rarely get to tell your whole story because of a time limit; here you often can, and I'll listen.

Testing         

            We no longer test new patients to allergens, via skin or blood. Since LDA covers all known allergens (inhaled, ingested and chemical (except pesticides directly), I have found it is an added expense to you that really offers no further benefit by doing it. Patients who have inhalant allergy are treated for those. Why bother to find all of the things a patient breathes,and to which patients are allergic, if one cannot avoid them without living in a bubble?

            The same is not necessarily true for foods, so if a patient has no idea to which foods they are sensitive, I often give them a multiple food elimination diet to discover foods that make them ill, so they can avoid those foods until they are treated. In any case, LDA will treat all food sensitivities, so foods to which patients are sensitive can be reintroduced back into the diet. Most patients know many of the foods that bother them, and that's good enough evidence to treat with LDA.

           So testing costs are now usually $0, which saves a lot of money you want to spend for the valuable thing: treatment with LDA.

          If your symptoms are not necessarily caused directly by external environmental agents, I'll get the all of the details from you and you may require lab work. Occasionally we test patients for HCG (used to treat PMS), herpes virus (to treat herpes) or histamine (to temporaily treat overt allergy symptoms during allergy season), and you may be scheduled for that testing if you need it. Please bring previous lab work with you from other physicians if you have any.

           If you don't download the intake forms from this site, you must arrive in our office 45 minutes before your first appointment, since you need to fill out these forms relating to the history of your illness, medications you take, etc.  You may download these forms from this site.  If you are unable to do this for any reason, and you would like to receive these forms ahead of time and fill them out at home, please call us (505-983-8890) and we would be happy to send them to you ahead of time.

   

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Copyright © 2005 Santa Fe Center for Allergy and Environmental Medicine
Last modified: April 12, 2015