In doing some research on Cholinergic Urticaria causes recently, I stumbled on a couple of articles that suggested that H. pylori, a bacterial infection of the stomach, could be linked to some diseases such as chronic hives, ulcers, gastritis, etc.
For those of you who don’t know, H. Pylori is one of the only bacteria known to be able to live inside of the highly acidic stomach walls. It is known to cause gastritis symptoms, and is usually the reason behind chronic ulcers.
The articles suggested that H. Pylori could be causing hives (such as Urticaria, Cholinergic), and a range of other allergic responses by “faking out” the immune system. The article suggested that some research indicates that Helicobacter Pylori does this by using a cellular mimicry, releasing chemicals to confuse our immune system.
Confirmed: I Tested Negative for Helicobacter Pylori
That sounded interesting, and so a while back when I was having the stomach problems, I decided to get a test done to see if my stomach aches/bloating/cramps and cholinergic urticaria (heat hives) were connected and possibly caused by this bacterial infection. This was several months ago, but I just wanted to post the results again.
I did have a blood test done & sent to a certified lab by my doctor, and the blood test came back negative for the H. Pylori infection. So, it seems that H. Pylori definitely isn’t causing CU in my case.
Later I discovered that by avoiding milk, my stomach problems cleared dramatically, in which case I realized I had a milk intolerance/lactose intolerance issue.
There was a great post in the cholinergic urticaria forum today, in which a cholinergic urticaria sufferer had an allergy test done. It seems he has a really high sensitivity/response to dust mites. Have any of you had an allergy test done? If so, please share your results in our forum as well.
As I have mentioned several times, it seems that there is some allergy-whether it be food, bacteria, mold, parasites, etc. that is causing this. It would be great if we could at least find out for sure what it was causing this. The first step in beating this thing is finding the cause (which could be different for each of us). Once we get that, we are halfway there!
UPDATE: 1/21/13 This is an old archived post, and I have made more recent posts regarding my new diet and how I was able to finally get my hives under control. Read more about it on my cholinergic urticaria diet page. What I essentially did was keep a journal and do several allergy elimination diets.