When your immune system reacts abnormally to medicine or drugs, it is known as a drug allergy. Mild reactions can cause nothing more than rashes, hives, fever or breathing problems, while a serious one can be life-threatening.
However, you may ignore and mistreat such allergies by confusing them for the side effects of medicines. Therefore, knowing rigorously about these allergies and the factors related to them is quite essential.
Drug or medicine allergies appear when your immune system responds abnormally to a drug. It can occur from any medication, including prescription, over-the-counter or herbal. There is no prominence of an immediate reaction after the first dose in most cases.
However, your immune system builds a specific substance called an antibody to fight the drug on its next dose, which causes such allergic reactions.
The following table shows the differences between drug allergy and side effects:
|
Drug Allergy |
Drug Side Effects |
|
It occurs as your body’s immune system mistakes the medicine as an invader. |
It occurs as a consequence of the medication. |
|
Allergies can be much more severe and life-threatening. |
Even severe side effects of medicine would not be life-threatening. |
|
It affects only certain people. |
It can affect anyone. |
|
Your immune system is actively involved in inducing medicine allergies. |
Your immune system rarely takes part in side effects due to medications. |
Your immune system fights with foreign substances like bacteria, parasites and viruses to protect you from diseases. A medicine allergy occurs when your immune system mistakes a drug and recognises it as an invader.
Consequently, it generates antibodies that are distinct proteins to fight the drug as a threat on its next dose. Unfortunately, these antibodies release a large amount of histamine that causes allergic symptoms in your body.
Below is a list of common symptoms of drug allergies:
Some severe symptoms of drug allergy are:
Symptoms of anaphylaxis, a life-threatening medicine allergy are:
People who are at risk of a drug allergy have the following factors:
Diagnosing medicine allergy is essential as misdiagnosis can lead to a more severe condition. Generally, a thorough physical examination and enquiry are enough for such allergies. In addition, the investigation may include questions on the occurrence and growth of symptoms and medication schedules.
However, a few other tests for drug allergy are essential to confirm them as follows:
Treating medicine allergy as soon as possible is necessary to prevent the symptoms from worsening. Below are some ways to treat such allergies:
As long as you know about the treatments, you must prevent any further drug allergies. Some of such precautionary measures are as follows:
A drug allergy may not be significant initially but can turn into something calamitous. Especially when it is mistreated as a mere side effect, it can get worse. However, this article contains all the essential details to clarify medicine allergy and factors related to it. Now, recognising one and undergoing proper treatment is not as conflicting as it was before.
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Disclaimer #2: This information is added only for informative purposes and collected from different sources across the Internet. Digit Insurance is not promoting or recommending anything here. Please verify the information before making any decisions.
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