Allergy Relief

By Clark Hansen, N.M.D.

March 13, 2008 - Many patients who come to my office in the Spring carry a box of kleenex and their bottle of Claritin the first time they come. They tell me that eventhough they are taking Claritin they are still sneezing incessantly, they cannot see out of their watery, itchy, red eyes and they are unable to think due to the congestion in their head.

These patients are often very skeptical when I tell them that their allergy is due to a deficiency of bioflavonoids and that I know a natural remedy that works better than Claritin. However, many of them call back within 30 minutes, after only one dose of the Flavinox that I prescribed for them. They call back just to tell me how amazed they are at how fast Flavinox works and how great they feel. They are so thankful that they can see and think again without having to take a drug that didn’t cure their problem and made them feel drowsy.

As many as 50 million people in the United States have allergies and nearly 36 million of them have hay fever, according to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology. Allergies affect at least 2 out of every 10 Americans. New research indicates that allergies may be due to a deficiency of polyphenol bioflavanoids which stabilize Mast Cells and prevent the release of histamine and other allergic chemicals. The richest source of these essential bioflavanoids is found in grape seeds, quercitin, and green tea, which work in concert with Vitamin C.

Allergies are an abnormal response by the immune system. People who have allergies have  an immune system that is over reacting to a normally harmless substance such as pollen, mold, animal dander, etc. These substances are called allergens.

Foods that are not digested completely can also become allergens and cause an allergic reaction in the gut, which can lead to Colitis, Crohn’s or Celiac disease. Food allergies have also been known to trigger other diseases such as eczema and asthma. Food allergies may even be the initiating trigger for auto immune diseases like multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis.

When a person is exposed to an allergen, the body produces an antibody. An immediate reaction such as hayfever, difficulty breathing, or hives is caused by Immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibodies. Delayed reactions such as eczema, fatigue, irritible bowel syndrome, etc., are caused by Immunoglobulin G antibodies. These antibodies are released by a type of blood cell known as the Mast Cell.

Mast Cells are the cells of the immune system that also release histamine, leukotrienes and other cytokines that are the chemicals that cause sneezing, watery, itchy eyes, itchy throat, swelling of the mucous membranes, etc. All of these symptoms are produced by the body to attempt to remove the allergen from the body. When you get into a dust storm or walk through a field of weeds with lots of pollen blowing in your eyes, nose and lungs, you want your immune system to react to wash the pollen out of your eyes, blow it out of your nose, or cough it out of your lungs. However, you certainly don’t want your Mast Cells over reacting to every single pollen or every food.

When the Mast Cells are healthy they have a thick membrane around them like a thick peel on an orange. However, when the Mast Cells are deficient in bioflavonoids their membranes are very thin. And just like a thin peeled orange that breaks open too easily and squirts its juice all over, so a Mast Cell that is lacking bioflavonoids is so thin that it breaks open much too easily and releases its histamine and other allergic chemicals far too easily.

That is why two people who go outside together can have such opposite reactions to inhaling the same air in the Spring. Standing side-by-side, one will take a deep breath and proclaim how much he loves the smell of citrus blossoms in the Spring, while the other stands there sneezing, and wiping her watery itchy eyes, cursing the smell and the wind.

Flavinox is a combination of nature’s most potent polyphenol bioflavanoids. It actually prevents histamine from being released rather than just blocking it once it has been released. Flavinox includes Quercitin, which comes from onions and apples, Grape Seed Extract and Green Tea polyphenols, plus Vitamin C. For more information about this amazing formula and what it can do for you, click here.