I have had chronic hives for 10-15 years on my chest back and head. They never go away.
Websites say that it is probably my immune system attacking itself and probably is a symptom of RA or Lupus.
Do any of you have chronic hives?
Hives are usually driven by excess histamine. It can be driven by RA, Lupus, Hashimoto's thyroiditis. Research histamine intolerance to see if you meet the criteria.
People with histamine intolerance tend to have dermatographia - you can write letters on your skin by scratching your skin to elicit a localized wheal similar to hives. If you're able to do this it's very likely you have histamine intolerance.
The problem is caused by a deficiency of the enzyme diamine oxidase and/or histamine methylatransferase. There are lab tests to confirm the problem. There appears to be a genetic predisposition to this problem, polymorphism of DAO.
Folic acid antagonists promote histamine (http://molpharm.aspetjournals.org/content/18/1/100.short) and B6 deficiency is associated with low diamine oxidase (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3098085). Quercitin can down-regulate histamine release (http://www.jimmunol.org/content/127/2/546.extract).
It may be a useful trial avoiding histamine rich foods for a couple of weeks to see how much that helps you. Those lists can be found on websites that cover histamine intolerance.
Hi. I have terrible skin itching but is not the same as yours. The red splotches and red straight and curved lines randomly attack my body. I have been to medical, dermatologist and allergist. No one has any definitive answers so I take an antihistamine 3x a day. It helps but I recently had a very bad episode and was taking the antihistamines every 3 hours , applying hydrocortisone cream and slathering on 100% dye free ,fragrance free,color and alcohol free aloe vera gel. I tried to think if I ate anything different changed anythng and I came up with a different inhaler my allergist gave me. I stopped taking it and the itching has subdued from level 10 plus to about a 2 or 3. I am going to see my allergies Friday for reevaluation. I wish you all the best.
HUGGGGGGGGS
Suzie
PS. My allergist did diagnose me with dermagraphics but the red lines and blotches only really bother me when they drive me crazy when the itch
Suzie, Refer to the references in my post above. Do research on histamine intolerance. Get tested as above. Pyridoxal-5-phosphate (activated B6), methylfolate, and quercetin can be remarkably helpful. Make sure you look into the charts on histamine intolerance sites and know how to lower your histamine load.
Histamine intolerance is made worse when a person has sulfite intolerance at the same time. Severe sulfite intolerance is rather rare, but milder forms are fairly common. Sulfite sensitivity seems to aggravate histamine intolerance. The enzyme that breaks down sulfites is sulfite oxidase. It is a molybdenum oxotransferase - the cofactors for this enzymes are molybdenum and riboflavin. There is a genetic polymorphism that effects this enzyme - SUOX.