I have a severe sensitivity to glycol. Are there any generics that are glycol free? Is there anyway to check for ingredients?
Answers (1)
ElizaJane2328 Jan 2012
Yes - hello to a fellow glycol allergy sufferer! It's not often I meet up with another person that is allergic to this dreadful by-product of industrial waste that is in everything around us! You can go to NIH's website pillbox.com - google it and look for the one by NIH. Type in the medication name (that's all you need) and it will show all the different generic & brand manufacturers and their inactive ingredients. You can rule some out this way - if it shows glycols, it's out. If it doesn't you can trust that, you have to research more. Google the manufurer and try to see if you can find the product on their website to look at the prescribing info. That, it seems, you can trust. If all else fails, call the manufacturer and ask to verify the inactive ingredients of their product. Hope this helps! - ElizaJane
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Just for curiosity, how were you exposed? Have you found any answers tothe glycol allergy? Are thereany treatments? Have you found a doctor that can help? I haven't found any help.
Yes, I have. I can't elaborate right now, but I promise I'll be back later today - have hope! There is a way - not easy sometimes, but liveable -
I was diagnosed at Johns Hopkins back in 1994 or 6? with an allergy to propylene glycol - they did patch testing. I was on a medication that had it in it, and was eating several foods that had it, and had a rash all over my face for over a year, and was having incredible migraines. Once I got off it, the problems lessened, but were still there until an anesthesiologist told me that I needed to avoid ALL glycols - then I made progress! For awhile if I got even the tiniest amount I started wheezing - after several years completely off it I can now have a little bit. No doctor will know about this, unfortunately you have to be your own expert. Check labels for everything, find a small pharmacy that you can trust to help you - and do your own research most of the time. The internet has been a big help too - just google propylene glycol or polyethylene glycol and read. There are small amounts of glycols that are too small to list - those are the ones I'm having problems with.
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I know it is in Vanillin - a vanilla flavoring that tests more like vanilla than vanilla. Anything that lists artificial flavorings - probably has it. they use it in coffee to make it sift better - milking cows are sprayed with an antibacterial wash that contains glycols so some people are having reactions from cows milk. Best
thing to do is to live life simply - no prepared foods, and read labels on everything. Glycols are cheap, industrialized waste and can make one be very, very sick. Sometimes I think I am better off not having this stuff in my life! Oh - they are almost always in cake mixes, except for angel food. Sorry there's no easy answer - but really, once you get your environment clean of it - you get used to it and it isn't anywhere near as hard. I have a pharmacy that does compounds near me - I now have 6 medications compounded. The pharmacy orders the active ingredient and places it into capsules for me, as there are no other manufacturers that make that medication without glycols in the inactive ingredients. A compounding pharmacy has been such a blessing! Even then - tell them to ask their compounding agency to list ALL substances - once they just assumed that if it was too small to be listed it wasn't important. That was a bad reaction for me! Check your shampoo, lotion, make up - I get most things at Whole Foods (still check labels). You just have to think of it all the time. If I can help you more, you can "friend" me and send me a private question - if I don't answer it means I didn't get notified, so try again - or post a comment to this question and I'll see it. Take care - ElizaJane
Also, check the propylene glycol or polyethylene glycol support group here on this site. I know there was another person asking about it. Sometimes glycols are listed under PEG - and then a number like PEG 3350. That means polyethylene glycol. Ethylene Glycol is antifreeze - polyethylene glycol is in your food. Scary huh? - ElizaJane