Re: Dermatitis
- Subject: Re: Dermatitis
- From: C* D* <c*@mac.com>
- Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:05:08 -0700
I'm sure everyone has at least one story.
My wife is very allergic to poison oak. She got a case one time when
she was taking a course in which she was to find examples of various
fungi. We went out into "forest" and collected. But she also
collected a case of poison oak. This was not a particularly good
thing for her to do since she was eight months pregnant at the time.
She went to the Health Center and the doctor there prescribed thirty
cortisone tablets the first day and then repeating daily, dropping
two pills each day! She was suspicious about this so she called her
obstetrician. He agreed, called the doctor at Health Center and read
him the riot act and told him to look at the patient next time! <br>
I seem to be one of the lucky ones and have never had a case that I
know of. This insensitivity is particularly obvious when one realizes
that I did archaeological surface surveys for thirty years, all over
our county. I was probably in minor contact with it quite often.
Because of her sensitivity, when I returned from these junkets I
would enter the garage through the side door, go to the washer, strip
and wash everything except my shoes, then streak through the house,
holding the shoes appropriately, hoping she wasn't entertaining a
bunch of her women friends! ---Chas---
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Interesting thread about skin reactions!
I helped a friend once by removing all of the Agapanthus in her
garden.
Apparently she got a bad reaction to the sap of this plant (I saw
her skin
react in real time! Uugh!). I've never found any information
about this in
the literature I've come across, yet there was no doubt she was
allergic (and
she was not a particularly allergic person).
Mention of California's poison oak is typical - there are people
who often say
they are not allergic (having never gotten a case). I was among
that throng
for much of my life (I was born and raised in California, and not
shy about
hiking into our local poison oak infested hills). My first case
was when I
slipped off a structure into a solidly dense patch of the stuff and
had to
wade out! I've never known such misery, let me tell you!! Welts
all over
every inch!
After that first exposure, it seemed all I had to do was see a
photo of poison
oak and I'd get another case. Gradually, over a number of years,
each of
these cases became less and less severe. Now, decades later, I
'seem' to be
'immune', or have built up some resistance. This is the profile of
some
others' I have talked with as well. But I would never tempt
fate . . .
A very nasty skim rash can be had by slicing Arum corms and
handling them, or
indeed the sap of most any of the Aroid family - the sap usually
contains
needle-like crystals which provide a pain like you might expect
from such
items!
Seán A. O'Hara
sean(at)gimcw.org
www.hortulusaptus.com
(ask about mediterranean climate gardening forum)
