Researchers Using Your Genetic Makeup To Protect You Against Allergies

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NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) - We may be only a month or so into the official start of winter, but in addition to the cold it's also the beginning of allergy season.

To help sufferers, researchers are looking into ways to help your genetic makeup protect you against allergies.

"Rather than just taking more and more medicines, and getting the complications of allergies -- like asthma eczema and infections, we're training your body to get rid of those allergies," explained Sunny Kallmer with Texan Allergy. "So, it's a natural and permanent long-term way to get rid of them."

Kallmer says there are a few options available, including drops that taste sweet, that can help train your immune system. "They do the exact same thing as a shot. We mix everything that you're allergic to in a small bottle and then you take it home. It's very easy, it's very affordable and convenient and patients just take three drops a day under their tongue."

It might be hard to believe but according to Kallmer, a person who is in misery suffering from Cedar Fever could very well have the same allergies as someone who doesn't feel any of the effects. "We all inherit the genes for allergies, it's whether or not your immune system turns those on or off throughout your lifetime. It could be within one or two years of getting exposed or it could be on your 80th year."

Experts say more than 60 million people suffer with allergies everyday and a great number of those individuals are apparently in the state of Texas. According to the non-profit patient organization Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America (AAFA), four Texas locations fall in the list of top 30 U.S. cities that are the most challenging places to live with fall allergies -- of those Dallas comes in at #17, El Paso at #26 and McAllen near the top of the list at #3.

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