The Food Intolerance Bible: A nutritionist's plan to beat food cravings, fatigue, mood swings, bloating, headaches and IBS. Antoinette Savill
or whether your cortisol level is very high (Adrenal Stress Profile), it may prove more than difficult to make any headway and improve your health, let alone resolve your food intolerances.
Certainly, a trial away from the foods you consume which best match the top five ‘Usual Suspects’ would be important, but first you need to make sure what else is having a detrimental effect on your health.
I Scored Low in Section 1, But High in Sections 2 and 3 of the Questionnaire
If your scores are heavily weighted in favour of the mental symptoms or physical signs and symptoms rather than the digestive symptoms, then you should take the urine test to measure your Intestinal Permeability. If positive, then follow the Gut Lining Support Plan.
If Your Score Is Above 71
It is hoped that no one scores this high, but if you do, I’d recommend you do a food intolerance test and seek the help of a qualified nutritionist. Do take along all the information from this book with you, including the completed questionnaires, as this can only help.
Your score is strongly suggestive of problems relating to food intolerance as well as at least one other significant imbalance. Please also make sure that you have seen your doctor to rule out any other underlying medical condition.
Alternatively, if you have already seen your doctor, you could follow the guidelines above for those who score between 51 and 70.
Food Intolerance Questionnaire Score Summary
| Your Score | Action |
| Total = 0–15 | Exclude the top two ‘Usual Suspects’ |
| Total = 16–25 | Exclude the top four ‘Usual Suspects’; follow the Digestive Support Plan |
| Total = 26–35 | Exclude top six ‘Usual Suspects’; follow the Digestive Support Plan |
| Total = 36–50 | Food Intolerance Lab Test OR Pulse Test and avoid the identified culprit foods; follow the Digestive Support Plan and the plan that combats any other identified condition |
| Total = 51–70 | Food Intolerance Lab Test and next most relevant test, and avoid the identified culprit foods; follow the Digestive Support Plan |
| Total = >71 | Food Intolerance Lab Test and visit a nutritionist |
| Total = > 36 | but combined score for Sections 2 and 3 is more than double that for Section 1 Intestinal Permeability Test |
EXPLAINING THE SECTION SCORES
You scores in each of the three different sections do not wholly alter the process of identifying food intolerance, nor which Plan you should follow. However, they do help you to distinguish between the different effects food intolerances are having in your body, as well as potentially highlighting other causes of your symptoms. This also simplifies completing the questionnaire next time, since you may only have to repeat the one relevant section rather than the entire questionnaire.
Section One is clearly mostly related to digestive issues, whereas Sections Two and Three refer to things going on elsewhere in the body. If your total score is 36 or more, and your score for Sections Two and Three (added together) is twice that of Section One, then you could have a leaky gut but without the associated digestive symptoms. In this instance it would be worthwhile testing your intestinal permeability (see urine test). However, please note that it is not worth taking this test if other markers within the digestive system are going to be measured and treated first.
If your score in Section One is half or less that of the combined totals of Sections Two and Three, then take the Intestinal Permeability test.
A Question of Severity
The questionnaires do not take severity into account, so if you have a severe symptom or set of symptoms, then even if you have not scored highly in the questionnaire please ask your doctor to investigate the matter.
Similarly, even if you have only some of the above symptoms (particularly those that score 2 points in The Food Intolerance Questionnaire) but their effect is severe, this is also worth further investigation. It may certainly be worthwhile analysing your diet to see how many of the Usual Suspects you eat on a regular basis, or eat a lot of. You may also want to think about taking a pulse test, and also one of the other food intolerance lab tests described in detail later in this book.
On-line Questionnaires
If you’d like a print-out of any of the questionnaires in this book, please visit www.thefoodintolerancebible.com.
How Does Food Intolerance Cause My Symptoms?
This is a major source of confusion and controversy. It is still not completely understood how food intolerance causes symptoms, though that’s not to say that the methods of identification are inaccurate. It’s just that the range of different reactions to foods makes it impossible to use a single method of testing to categorize food intolerance neatly into one box.
IMMUNE REACTIVITY
Your food intolerance reactions are mostly mediated by your immune system, as a result of the delicate interactions between food, your digestive tract, white blood cells and food-specific antibodies called immunoglobulins, as mentioned in the Introduction. There are five types of immunoglobulin: IgA, IgD, IgE, IgG and IgM. The molecules of food to which the body makes antibodies are referred to as antigens. Given that you eat three to four times a day, effectively exposing your body to foreign substances in the process, the food you eat easily represents the single biggest antigenic challenge confronting the human immune system – so perhaps it should not be surprising that your body would make antibodies to foods as often as to any other ‘foreign’ matter it encounters.
HYPERSENSITIVITY
Hypersensitivity reactions have been categorized in various ways, although even this does not always help us when it comes to determining the most appropriate tests that should be done. Nor does this change that fact that you need to avoid the culprit food(s) and address other aspects of your health as necessary. Categorizing reactions is of much more use to scientists and practitioners involved in the field. However, showing you the different categories will help you to understand why symptoms such as yours may have been misunderstood or misdiagnosed in the past. It will also help you to understand why some tests can be wholly inappropriate for you and your symptoms.
These are the classifications for hypersensitivity reactions:
Type I – Immediate IgE reactions
Type II – Cytotoxic antibody-mediated reactions
Type III – Delayed-onset, mainly IgG-mediated reactions
Type IV – Cell-mediated and T Cell-mediated reactions which may also involve IgG reactions
Now let’s take a look at each one in more detail.
Type I – Immediate IgE reactions
These