Food Sensitivity Testing in San Clemente, CA

Allergy testing looks for IgE and for reactions that can be immediate and dangerous. This panel looks at IgG and IgA, which are different antibodies and a different conversation. A positive line here does not mean you will have anaphylaxis, and a negative line does not prove a food is safe if you already know it swells your throat. Emergency reactions belong with an allergist, not with this report.

Food sensitivity testing is a hypothesis generator. Dr. Tara Kohen treats a high antibody as a food to trial, not as a sentence. Food sensitivities people can feel as headache, bloating, skin changes, or a next-day slump are delayed and muddy. The lab tries to shorten the guesswork. It does not replace noticing what your body does when the food returns.

The report can light up foods you eat every day. That is common, and it is also why the list cannot be obeyed as a lifestyle magazine. Daily foods are the ones your immune system has seen most. Some of those lines matter. Some are noise from exposure. The only way to sort them is to remove a short list and watch symptoms, then bring foods back one at a time.

Headache that seems tied to meals is one reason to consider the panel. Gut health complaints are another. A panel ordered because a friend had one, with no symptom that food might explain, is a weak reason. The history picks the question. The kit does not pick the patient.

FRI uses the report next to an elimination trial, not instead of one. A few foods come out for a defined stretch. The stretch has an end. During it, the rest of the diet should stay fed and boring enough that you can tell what changed. Removing twenty foods at once makes the trial unreadable and hard to live with. Dr. Sani Kohen would rather test three honest removals than a heroic menu nobody keeps.

Reintroduction is the part that makes the trial clinical. One food returns, in a normal portion, with a couple of quiet days to watch. A clear symptom return supports leaving it out for a while longer. No symptom means it can stay, even if the antibody was high. Antibodies can fall as exposure falls. They are not a tattoo. Nutrition and supplementation may help the trial stay nutritionally sane, without a product pitch.

A permanent ban list is how people end up afraid of food and short on nutrients. The goal is the smallest set of limits that actually changes symptoms, reviewed later. Many foods return. A few may stay out longer if every reintroduction repeats the symptom. That is a practical limit, not an identity.

The sample is often a small blood collection, arranged with the kit instructions. The lab fee is additional and is named as such before you order. Review visits often run 30 to 60 minutes depending on the plan. A free 20-minute consultation can decide if antibodies are worth drawing. The office is out of network, accepts HSA and FSA cards, and provides a superbill for the clinical visit.

Expect the report to be translated into a short removal list and a calendar for bringing foods back. You will not be asked to memorize dozens of red bars. You will be asked to track a few symptoms you already have, in plain language, so the trial has an outcome besides the lab.

If you have had a true allergic reaction, wheezing, throat tightness, or a prior anaphylaxis, say so before any reintroduction. Those foods are not experimented with here. The trial is for delayed, non-emergency symptoms. Anything that sounds like an emergency is an emergency, not a line on an IgG report.

San Clemente has two terrains that matter clinically. The Pier Bowl, the beach trail, and the streets near the water are relatively level and sandy. Talega, Forster Ranch, and the newer hills are the opposite: repeated grades, youth sports, and a drive just to reach I-5. Surfing at Trestles and along the pier loads shoulders and low backs. Hill neighborhoods load knees on the way down and necks on the drive. We ask which part of town you live in because the home program has to match the grade outside.

A lot of San Clemente patients are trying to stay active while working north of here. The I-5 commute itself is a sitting test. If your low back or sciatica eases when you walk the beach trail and worsens in the car, that detail changes the exam. Tell us the direction of the commute and how long you sit, not only where it hurts.

The drive is I-5 north through San Juan Capistrano into Mission Viejo, about 16 miles. Without a slowdown it is a little over 20 minutes. A backup through the Capistrano stretch pushes it toward 35. Exit for the La Alameda side of Mission Viejo and come to 26400 La Alameda, Suite 100, CA 92691. Parking is on site. The doors are open Monday through Thursday, 9 to 6.

Because the drive is simple, people sometimes stack a visit onto a day that already includes a surf and a commute. Say if that is the plan. We may want the exam before the surf, or we may want you to skip the session that morning so the tests mean something. Call (949) 312-1754 if you are sorting the order. The 20-minute consultation can be the first appointment if you are not ready for a full evaluation.

Board sports and trail hills make shoulder, neck, and knee complaints ordinary reasons to come north. McKenzie-based spine care is a fit when back or leg pain has a clear directional preference. Corrective exercise is how a Talega hill gets written into the plan instead of fought with a generic core sheet.

Families also come for problems that are not sports. Thyroid, sleep, and migraine questions are evaluated with the limits those conditions require. A migraine plan does not replace a neurologist. A thyroid plan does not replace the prescriber. Read the city overview at the San Clemente chiropractor page.