WHAT YOUR PULSE CAN TELL YOU ABOUT ALLERGY

In some people, eating troublesome food will speed up their pulse. First noticed by Arthur F. Coca, an allergist and immunologist, that phenomenon was described at length in his book, The Pulse Test (Lyle Stuart). According to Dr Coca, taking your pulse after meals helps to identify allergy-causing foods.

Say you have a hunch you’re allergic to wheat. Take your pulse when you first get up in the morning. Lightly press two or three fingers of one hand over the artery just inside the wrist of the opposite hand, below the thumb. (Don’t try to feel your pulse with the thumb – it’s got a pulse of its own.) Count the beats felt in exactly one minute and write it down. (The average is about 60 to 80 per minute.)

Take your pulse again just before eating a single serving of the wheat alone (or any other suspected food). Then take it again 30 minutes and 60 minutes after the test serving. An abnormal increase in pulse- unrelated to infection, exercise or stress, that is – presumably indicates an allergy.

Sounds pretty remarkable. But William J. Rea, a cardiovascular (heart) doctor in Dallas, told us that the pulse test doesn’t work for everyone. ‘In about one-third of the people, the pulse will go up/ he says. ‘In another third, it will go down. And in another third, it stays the same. And some people will experience any one of those changes at different times, depending on what they eat.

‘So it’s only good if there’s a definite, consistent change in the individual/ he continued. ‘For example, I have one secretary who, anytime she has a food reaction, also has a ten-point or higher elevation in pulse. Every time. No question about it. So for her, it works.

‘We do use the pulse test routinely’, Dr Rea told us, ‘because it’s one objective measure. But we don’t rely on the pulse test alone. After all, no test is 100 per cent reliable.’

In other words, the pulse test is a tool that may be helpful if used along with a food diary and elimination-and-challenge diets.