It's Official

Heath in the subway
on the way to his appointment

Last week, Heath had an appointment with a pediatric allergist. The first part of the appointment was spent talking with the doctor about what happened when Heath ate peanut butter back in November. She did say that Heath should have been given epinephrine while they were at the mall. She was also fairly sure he would test positive for peanut allergy. 


After we talked, the doctor left the room and a nurse came in to educate us. We learned {again} how to use the epipen and how to keep Heath safe. After the education bit was over, the doctor came back in and we talked about the future. We'll go back in when Heath is 3 and hope that he will be allergy-free. 


We left the doctor's office and Heath had a blood draw. No baby likes a blood draw and he knew all about it having had an IV last month. But it was quick, they are pros! 


So on Monday we got a call with the results from the blood test. Heath IS allergic to peanuts and is NOT allergic to tree nuts. He scored a 62.7 and is a level 5. Basically...very allergic to peanuts. Here is a little chart from wikipedia.org:

RAST rating	IgE level (KU/L)	comment
0	< 0.35	ABSENT OR UNDETECTABLE ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
1	0.35 - 0.69	LOW LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
2	0.70 - 3.49	MODERATE LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
3	3.50 - 17.49	HIGH LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
4	17.50 - 49.99	VERY HIGH LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
5	50.0 - 100.00	VERY HIGH LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE
6	> 100.00	EXTREMELY HIGH LEVEL OF ALLERGEN SPECIFIC IgE

Finding out that he truly is allergic to peanuts has not been super easy. It is really a fairly big life change. We will have no peanuts or tree nuts in the house and purchase nothing that has been manufactured in a plant with those things. We're getting really good at reading labels!


Aside from being allergic to peanuts, Heath is healthy. We're very thankful for that. We're looking forward to celebrating Christmas...but no peanuts in our stockings this year, Santa!