Who carries out hay fever tests?

If you are interested in getting yourself tested for hay fever allergies there are a few different avenues you can explore. It is possible to buy self-diagnosis test kits from various medical supply companies. These kits can be purchased and run in your own home and will tell you whether or not you have elevated levels of IgE in your system. Be very careful when running these home kits though as they are often misleadingly advertised as ‘hay fever detection kits.’ They claim to detect whether you are allergic to ‘pollen,’ but what they actually do is measure the IgE levels in the blood. If they are high, the test gives you a positive. If they are low, the test comes back negative. You could in fact be suffering from a completely different sort of allergy (thus causing the elevated IgE levels) and think that you have hay fever simply because your ‘hay fever detection kit’ came back as positive.

To be one hundred percent certain about the specific allergen causing your hay fever, go and see a certified allergist/immunologist. This is a qualified doctor who has undergone specialised training to diagnose and treat allergies. By going to your GP and discussing your concerns, your GP can then give you a referral to a qualified specialist. Once you meet your specialist, you can discuss your symptoms, undergo allergy tests and have help in planning out the best possible treatments to relieve your hay fever symptoms.

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