Low Dose Immunotherapy – A Breakthrough Treatment for Allergies and Chemical Sensitivities
Dr. Hotze talks about the benefits of this breakthrough treatment for food and airborne allergies, as well as for chemical sensitivities – low dose immunotherapy, or LDI.
Podcast Highlights:
0:29: …a lot of people don’t realize that an allergy or having allergies can adversely affect the immune system.
0:38: …allergies are an abnormal reaction by a person’s immune system to normal substances in the environment…
1:04: What happens when you have allergies? You make antibodies to these various allergens as if they were some kind of foreign pathogen in your body, like a virus or bacteria…
2:22: And by the way, this happens in the brain, as well. People can have allergies and it can affect the way they think, the way they feel mentally and their sharpness. It can adversely affect kids and give them autoimmune disorders.
3:40: Well, just over the last several years, we have become aware of the wonderful opportunity we have to provide an even more convenient and more affordable allergy treatment for patients. It is called Low Dose Immunotherapy. And instead of having to take a shot once a week or drops under your tongue every day, you put drops under your tongue once every 7 or 10 weeks.
5:55: I’m so confident in this because we’ve had somewhere on the order of 80 to 90% resolution of allergy problems using this particular method…
6:30: It stimulates the T cells, which are a certain type of immune cell in your body. It down-regulates those cells, so they don’t create inflammation in your body from the allergy reaction. And it’s a remarkable treatment that we’ve had great success with.
7:01: And we’ve used this on young children who’ve had terrible problems with eczema all over their body because they had combined food and inhaled allergy problems. And we’ve treated these young kids one, two, three years old, and they’ve just resolved their eczema. It’s remarkable.
7:37: Allergies load down your immune system, and when that happens, your immune system isn’t capable of responding to viruses and bacteria that it should be fighting off, if it’s working overtime trying to fight off the allergen that you come in contact within your environment.
7:53: So we want to stop the allergy reaction, take the load off the immune system, so your immune system healthy and well. And when your immune system’s healthy and well, guess what? You’ll be healthy and well.
Podcast Transcription:
Stacey Bandfield: Welcome to Dr. Hotze’s Wellness Revolution. I’m Stacey Bandfield here with Dr. Steven Hotze, founder of the Hotze Health & Wellness Center. We have a great program today. With all of the attention that’s been placed on the immune system, a lot of people don’t realize that an allergy or having allergies can adversely affect the immune system. Isn’t that right, Dr. Hotze?
Dr. Steven Hotze: Exactly. And allergies are an abnormal reaction by a person’s immune system to normal substances in the environment, things they breathe in the air. We treat grass pollens, dust mites, mold spores and animal danders, foods that they eat, and chemicals they come in contact with. All these in a person that has a genetic predisposition towards allergies will begin to make abnormal reactions within their system and this will burden the immune system.
What happens when you have allergies? You make antibodies to these various allergens as if they were some kind of foreign pathogen in your body, like a virus or bacteria, and you make these antibodies and they bind to mast cells that line your nasal pharynx and your throat and in your lungs and down into your esophagus. And when you’re exposed to these allergens over and over again, those antibodies will rupture the mast cells spilling out histamine.
What does that do?
Stacey Bandfield: Sounds familiar.
Dr. Steven Hotze: Histamine causes the blood vessels in the tissues to swell and to drain it, and now you have a culture medium, you have that chronic drainage. You have a culture medium for an infection for a viral or bacterial infection, and that’s what inevitably happens with people that have recurrent and chronic allergies, they’ll get sinus infections or bronchial infections, skin disorders, stomach problems, all because they’re having an abnormal reaction by their immune system to these common allergies.
Now, any of these things can lead to the rupture and the spilling of histamine. That’s why people run after the store and say, get me an antihistamine. I have allergies. The antihistamine is meant to neutralize the histamine that reacts and causes the tissue to swell. And by the way, this happens in the brain, as well. People can have allergies and it can affect the way they think, the way they feel mentally and their sharpness. It can adversely affect kids and give them autoimmune disorders.
So when the Hotze Health & Wellness Center started back in 1989 and moved here to our current facility in 1991, we were strictly an allergy practice. That’s all we did. We treated people for chronic allergy problems, the recurrent sinuses, the recurrent ear infections, the recurrent bronchitis, the asthma, skin disorders, eczema, and all these sorts of things. We treated for that.
And initially, we started using with our testing, after we tested, skin tested, we would then have injections of these various allergens. You take an allergy shot on a weekly basis. Well, that lasted for about four or five years, and I was encouraged by other allergists in my society to use sublingual drops. So we took the various very allergens that we give on a weekly basis and we put them in little dropper bottles and we began to give people allergy drops under their tongue on a daily basis. And we found out that we had tremendous results with that. And we basically eliminated all injectable allergy immunotherapy.
Low Dose Immunotherapy (LDI)
Well, just over the last several years, we have become aware of the wonderful opportunity we have to provide an even more convenient and more affordable allergy treatment for patients. It is called Low Dose Immunotherapy. And instead of having to take a shot once a week or drops under your tongue every day, you put drops under your tongue once every 7 or 10 weeks. And those drops contain the common airborne allergens, common food allergens, and even the common chemicals that people are allergic to in my new doses.
It’s interesting, allergies are very much like homeopathic medicine. Most physicians don’t understand allergy treatment other than, oh, well, take anti-…got an infection, take an antibiotic. We’ll give you a Medrol dose pack and you’ll be over it. Well, that doesn’t treat the underlying allergic disorder, which is caused by the abnormal antibodies that are made to allergens.
And for those people that have allergens, it costs a ton of time and money, loss of work. They say that allergy, billions and billions of dollars are lost every year in the workplace and to individuals because they have recurrent and chronic allergy problems, which flare up commonly in the fall and in the spring, but that can happen year around, particularly if you have mold sensitivities and in Houston. We have a big problem with that because we’ve got a lot of wet weather and we have a lot of mold problems in Houston.
So, what we want to do is provide a very simple system of treatment of allergies, and we’re excited to offer Low Dose Immunotherapy. It’s going to dramatically cut the cost of allergy treatment because instead of having to supply you with bottles that you have to take on a daily basis and you have to have five sets of bottles every year, we can treat you once every 7 to 10 weeks with one dose, and we can adjust that dose based upon your response to it. After we’ve done testing on you, we’ll create a dose for you, and then we’re going to follow you and see how you’re doing, see if you have resolution of your symptoms.
I’m so confident in this because we’ve had somewhere on the order of 80 to 90% resolution of allergy problems using this particular method, which means you don’t have to go anywhere. We send you the allergy drops and you inject it once, not even with a needle. You just squirt it under your tongue once every 7 to 10 weeks. Well, that’s remarkable. And within 18 months, you can cut that back to maybe once a year or twice a year. It’s all you have do to take it. And what it does is it doesn’t block the antibodies. It stimulates the T cells, which are a certain type of immune cell in your body. It down-regulates those cells, so they don’t create inflammation in your body from the allergy reaction. And it’s a remarkable treatment that we’ve had great success with.
I’m so confident in it that if anybody wants to get on the allergy treatment, I give them a year and if it doesn’t work out in a year, I will completely return your money, if it didn’t work. I’m so confident in this therapy. And we’ve used this on young children who’ve had terrible problems with eczema all over their body because they had combined food and inhaled allergy problems. And we’ve treated these young kids one, two, three years old, and they’ve just resolved their eczema. It’s remarkable.
So I’m excited to present Low Dose Immunotherapy that we’re offering now at the Hotze Health & Wellness Center as part of our allergy program. And I want to encourage you if you’re having allergy problems, if you have recurrent and chronic allergy problems or you and your kids do, make sure you get your allergies under control, and that takes the load off your immune system.
Allergies load down your immune system, and when that happens, your immune system isn’t capable of responding to viruses and bacteria that it should be fighting off, if it’s working overtime trying to fight off the allergen that you come in contact within your environment. So we want to stop the allergy reaction, take the load off the immune system, so your immune system healthy and well. And when your immune system’s healthy and well, guess what? You’ll be healthy and well.
Stacey Bandfield: Yes. And that’s such a great point you make too, Dr. Hotze, a bout inflammation, what you were saying earlier, because you like to say that inflammation is sort of that underlying root cause of disease in general.
Dr. Steven Hotze: Right.
Stacey Bandfield: And so when your body is inflamed, you’re really opening up that door for other conditions. So definitely, if you think that you have allergies, you should definitely get tested. And it’s a game changer. It’s a no-brainer, money-back guarantee, easy to use, very effective. We really encourage you to give us a call today at the Hotze Health & Wellness Center, (281) 698-8698. That’s (281) 698-8698. It would be a privilege to partner with you. Thank you for joining us today on Dr. Hotze’s Wellness Revolution.
