Всё о Гипертензии(гипертонии)-About Hypertension

Colourings, E100-180. These include both natural colourings and synthetic ones. Some of the ‘natural’ colours are extracted from grass, nettles and other plants, or produced by a chemical process. There is a new trend towards colours produced by fungal cells or plant cells in culture – because these too can be labelled ‘natural’, even though we would not consider eating the items from which they are derived. Such colours are being sought as a replacement for the synthetic colours known as azo-dyes, which have caused much concern. Azo-dyes include colours such as tartrazine, sunset yellow and amaranth – a complete list is given at the end of this section. Eighteen of these artificial colours are permitted in Britain – of these, eleven are banned in the United States, and six are not approved by the EEC, because they are suspected of being carcinogens. Two of the ‘natural’ colours – caramel (E150) and vegetable carbon black (E153) – are also potential carcinogens (some forms of caramel appear to be safe but not others

most of it is now made by chemical processes). Carbon black is banned in the United States. Apart from their potentially carcinogenic effect, many of the azo-dyes have been reported as causing sensitivity reactions, especially in children.

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If you go through the withdrawal symptoms, feel greatly improved for a while, but then begin to go downhill again, this is a rather bad sign. It does not happen to many people, but if it does happen to you then you need to think very carefully about the situation.

The most likely explanation is that you are developing a new sensitivity to something allowed on the exclusion phase – probably something you are eating a lot of. Look at your food record for the exclusion phase, and try to work out what this might be – foods you ate plentifully before the diet are also suspects. Cut out any such foods and see what happens. Meanwhile make great efforts not to eat too much of any one food. Introducing some rare foods – may be the answer, but don’t overindulge in these either or you may spoil your chances of doing a rare-food diet later.

If you get better again, and stay better for two or three days, then you can begin the reintroduction phase. Continue to vary your diet as much as possible during this period – if you can, go on to a rotation diet. If you can’t manage a four-day rotation, then three days will be some help at least.

If you are still not well, or if you have unclear results during the reintroduction phase, then the best plan is to go straight on to Stage 3, preferably a rare-food diet. As a last resort, you could try an elemental diet but only with medical supervision.

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The risks of a child developing allergies can be gauged, very roughly, from the health of the parents. If one parent has allergic symptoms, the chances of the child being atopic – predisposed to allergy – is 20-35 per cent. If both parents have allergies, the likelihood rises to 40-60 per cent. Where both parents are affected in the same way – if both have asthma, for example, or both have rhinitis (runny or congested nose) – then the chances are 50-70 per cent.

If neither parent has allergies, but one or both come from families with a history of allergic disease, then there is also an increased risk of the child being affected. However, almost a third of atopics are born into families where no allergic symptoms have ever been noticed. So predicting which babies will be prone to allergies by looking at their families is, at best, an inexact science.

A more accurate prediction can be made by laboratory tests that measure the amount of IgE being produced by the child. The level can be measured by taking a sample of blood from the newborn baby, or by measuring the IgE level in blood from the umbilical cord. A high level indicates that a child has a greater chance of going on to develop allergies. However, this test requires very sensitive chemical analysis, and is unlikely to be available in most hospitals.

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Is there any scientific evidence for either of these opposing views? The main piece of evidence for the ‘tense-mother/crying-baby’ idea is that first babies tend to cry more than subsequent ones – doctors infer from this that the mother’s inexperience is an important factor. However, there is no data to show that first babies really do cry more – it is just a subjective impression. One study that investigated this idea found that there was little difference between first babies and later ones. Even if a first baby does cry more, the link with maternal anxiety is still only a speculative one, and there are other, far more plausible explanations.

The evidence for the second point of view is limited, but certainly stronger than that for the first. A Swedish study of 19 bottle-fed babies with colic found that over 70 per cent improved when changed to formula feeds that did not contain whole cow’s-milk protein. The same research team found that cow’s milk in the mother’s diet could cause colic in breast-fed babies.

Another trial carried out in New Zealand, and widely quoted in the medical literature, apparently failed to find any link between the mother’s diet and colic in breast-fed babies. In fact there were several serious flaws in this trial, and its findings have been widely misrepresented anyway. Twenty mothers were involved, and the main focus of the trial was the role of cow’s milk in causing colic. The mothers were asked to avoid cow’s milk, and were then challenged with it in a disguised form, so that they would not know when they were drinking milk and when they were drinking the ‘control’ substance. Soya milk was used for this ‘control’ without any investigation of whether the babies might be sensitive to soya proteins. The mothers were given milk-with-soya to drink for two days or soya only for two days – there was an interval of two, four or six days between the milk challenges. Experience suggests that this may not be long enough to detect changes in the baby’s symptoms -although some babies recover within 24 hours of the mother eliminating offending foods from her diet, others can take many days, sometimes as much as two weeks, for their colic to settle down. The whole trial only continued for 12 days.

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Whereas food allergy reactions can be provoked by quite small amounts of the food – a smear of the food from a badly washed saucepan for some highly allergic individuals – much larger quantities are needed to provoke the symptoms of food intolerance. Food intolerance is also far more insidious than food allergy: it is often difficult to say when it began, because the symptoms are very mild at first but gradually get worse. There are exceptions to this rule however, for in some cases a bad bout of influenza or diarrhoea can spark off food intolerance. As in Susan’s case, those with food intolerance tend to col-lea more and more new symptoms as the years go by, and become intolerant of more and more foods.

Food allergy usually persists for many years, often for a lifetime, even though the food is scrupulously avoided. Food intolerance, on the other hand, may well disappear if the food is not eaten for a few months. But it will tend to recur if the food is ever eaten regularly again.

The symptoms of food intolerance are extraordinarily varied and affect almost every body system. The illustration opposite summarizes the major symptoms that are generally agreed upon. Most doctors working in this field would probably wish to add various other symptoms to this list, and there is intense debate over symptoms that might or might not be attributed to food.

An important aspect of food intolerance is that the symptoms are not constant – they tend to come and go and vary in severity. Non-food factors may play an important part, particularly stress, which can greatly exacerbate the symptoms. One of the most curious facets of food intolerance is that the person concerned often has a craving for the particular food or foods that cause the problem. In such cases – which account for as many as 50 per cent of food-intolerant patients – eating the food initially gives a sense of great well-being.

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