16 Ridge Park
Purley
Surrey
CR8 3PN
020 8647 8309
07980 914 815
maryroe@blueyonder.co.uk
www.maryroefoodintolerancetesting.co.uk
Professor Jonathan Brostoff
Professor Emeritus of Allergy and Environmental Health
Kings College
London SE1
Dear Professor Brostoff,
I am a registered nurse with 15 years experience of using a Vega machine to test for food intolerance. I have recently read the latest publication of your ‘Complete Guide to Food Allergy and Intolerance’, [having read all the previous versions,] and would like to ask your advice. I am not an academic, or in any way a scientist, but recognising your open-mindedness from your book, would like to let you know of the results that I am achieving with my patients / clients, and wish to ask for your advice as to the best way in which I might proceed with my testing and recording of data.
Regarding the reliability of the machine, I know that George Lewith had high hopes of the study that he conducted in Southampton, and was disappointed that when testing ‘blind’ the testers’ results were so unreliable. However the results that I am achieving with my clients seem to prove that the machine ‘works’ in certain hands. I think that it was unfortunate that cat hair and house dust mite were the ampoules chosen to be used in the study, as I find the ‘cat’ ampoule extremely unreliable. I think that this may be because there is such a difference between all cats, and some people are fine with one cat, but wheezing, sneezing and itchy with others. I therefore have stopped using my cat ampoule, preferring to do test individual cat [or dog] fur. As regards house dust mite, many people that I see have had a positive skin test to house dust mite, and have come to the conclusion that they will have to learn to live with their symptoms. Many of these people [maybe completely by chance, or maybe because once someone has asthma or rhinitis their symptoms are likely to be exacerbated by some chemicals] react on testing to fragrances in polishes, kitchen cleaners, fragranced candles, air fresheners, and stop wheezing, sneezing, etc when these products are no longer used. Perhaps a comparison between skin testing results and vega results will always be difficult, because of false positives etc
In 2001/2 I conducted a survey of 364 clients in order to assess how well my system worked, and which foods most often caused which symptoms. Please find enclosed an analysis of those results. In December 2009, I started another survey, and have in the last few weeks just started to get results in. I realise that the numbers of results are so far very small, and cannot be counted on just yet, until I have a much bigger pool of data. So far, with only 10 clients’ replies back in [2 out of 12 not replied as yet] my results are looking really good, with an average of 87% improvement over all symptoms presented with. If I average out the improvement made by each individual client, add up all those averages and divide by the number of clients, the average improvement is 91%. I have attached a very rudimentary spreadsheet of those results.
As I am aware that the Vega machine reliability is not 100%, I have tried to put right that negative aspect. I have for the last 4 months suggested to patients, that if they are not better within one week, they return [for free], for a retest of their regular daily foods and any further suspects that they have, bringing along their tap water, a slice of bread that they most commonly eat, and any food or drink regularly consumed which has many ingredients. 17% returned to find that they had one of the following problems.
- All animal milks as well as cows milk products [17% of clients with a cows milk intolerance, who were 45% of total clients]….. undetectable at first session, as Vega will not pick up a food intolerance if the food has not been eaten before]
- Developed an intolerance to another food either through over-using it, or because I got a different result at first testing session [11% of total clients]
- Had an intolerance to something not tested at first session [4% of total clients]… an emulsifier in their normal bread, a preservative in fruit squash [all of which I now have in my testing kit]
It seems that by cutting out the unreliability of the vega, by listening to clients, and using my experience, I am managing to achieve very good results [on the small number so far, very much improved on 8 years ago] I am constantly learning from my patients, just by listening to them. Often their suspicion is incorrect, but understandable. Clients who are proved wrong are happy when things are explained, and that foods that they thought were an issue are not in fact a problem. Sometimes their suspicion is correct, and I learn something more to add to my memory bank.
You will notice that I rarely find that wheat is a problem. Recently I have made some changes to my working practice in order to ensure that my results are reliable. To this end I have obtained a new wheat ampoule, and have started testing organic, non-organic, wholemeal and white flours.
Based on my experience, I find that a lot of my clients suspect that their problem is wheat, but when I test them, we find that the main problem is yeast. I always find that when yeast is a problem, all cheeses and yogurts are too. Science not being my forte, I cannot say scientifically why that might be, but I can back this up with data. Is it something to do with fermentation? [By the way, I rarely find that someone with a yeast intolerance is intolerant to all alcohols, just sometimes to their favourite type.]
There also seems to be a link between yeast and malt. I do not have precise figures yet, but suspect that the percentage of people who have a ‘spin-off’ intolerance to malt to be about 25%
So what might happen is that a person thinks that wheat is a problem because they get symptoms after
Bread,
Pizza
Pasta.
Some biscuits
Some breakfast cereals
But all of the above foods contain yeast or malt, and/ or might be eaten with cheese or yogurt.
Bread contains yeast
Pizza contains yeast and cheese
Pasta may be with a cheese sauce, or have cheese grated onto it.
Sweet and savoury biscuits may contain malt. Savoury biscuits may contain yeast, and may be eaten with cheese.
Many breakfast cereals contain malt. Or the person may be reacting to milk rather than the cereal.
If a person is advised to avoid wheat, when the problem is actually yeast, of course they will not see symptomatic improvement if:
they use breads made from other grains than wheat, as these will still contain yeast.
they still eat cheese with alternative pastas.
there is malt in any alternative crispbreads or breakfast cereals that they eat.
they use any alternative cheeses or yogurts in order to avoid cows milk products,
if they consume malt vinegar
In one of the main IBS studies, [still regularly quoted 30 years later] John Huntley’s suggested introduction of yeast was in the form of marmite or brewers yeast tablets. I routinely [since December 2009] test brewers yeast, and have not yet found one yeast intolerant person who is sensitive to it. Perhaps the people in that study who introduced yeast in the form of brewers yeast then went on to introduce wheat [trying bread as they though that yeast was OK for them] had a reaction, and presumed that it was because of wheat.
Most vega testers have a total of
- 70 foods, many of which are extremely unlikely to be a problem to sufferers of food intolerance. I now have 121, many of which are. [eg sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, mustard, honey, cranberry, grapefruit, vodka, peach, peppermint, peppermint flavouring, malt, barley malt, malt flavour, malt vinegar, spirit vinegar] all of which may be frequent foods to some people, and therefore put them at risk of becoming intolerant. All of this has come about by talking to clients of what their frequent foods are, and sometimes when their symptoms occur in relation to meals.
- 27 additives, 3 of which commonly cause problems. Since finding by testing foods with many ingredients that other additives are more often an issue to most people I have added another 25 more additives to those that I routinely test, making a total of 52. Although these additives are not as commonly a problem as say, milk, cocoa and orange, if such an ingredient is a daily feature in his/her regular squash or bread, consuming it will make a massive difference to that person’s quality of life.
Bearing in mind that a lot of experts in the food intolerance world say that people like me could advise wheat and cows milk avoidance and get good results, how is it that my results are so good when wheat is an intolerance that I rarely find?
I hope that you will be able to find the time to advise me in some way. I feel that I have a tremendous amount of useful information to impart, especially for those people who feel unable, or maybe not unwell enough, to undertake a full elimination diet. A few questions…
- Would you advise me to make contact with anyone else?
- How many people should I include in my survey? I have seen 60 so far, and in 3 months time should have results data on most of those. 100? 200?
- Should I somehow include some kind of ‘blind’ component in it? I would happily start all over again when I have finished this survey.
I look forward to your reply.
Yours sincerely
Mary Roe