What Is It Like to Get a Skin Patch Test for Allergies?
Key takeaways:
A skin patch test for allergies involves applying small amounts of allergens to the skin to see if a reaction occurs.
The test helps identify specific substances causing allergic reactions.
The test is uncomfortable, but knowing what you are allergic to is a relief, says Tayler Gates, who went through a skin patch test to determine her allergies.
Imagine being the itchiest you’ve ever been but not being allowed to scratch.
That’s a vivid description of a skin patch test for allergies from Tayler Gates, 25, a sales professional in the printing industry who lives in Central City, Kentucky.
Despite this experience, she is still firmly pro skin patch test.
Search and compare options
“It’s kind of like the birthing pains,” she says. “You have to go through it to get to the joy.”
She posted a TikTok video about her skin patch test, and when people ask if they should do it, she encourages them.
“To be able to sort of dissect your routines and the ingredients that you put on your body and expose yourself to, this is how you get that relief and remove those things,” Tayler says. “It’s a great thing. I’m not going to say everybody should do it. But people who have skin issues, eczema, a large variety of skin reactions — I always recommend those people do it.”
Journey starts with hives and biopsies
In 2019, Tayler noticed she was regularly breaking out in itchy hives. This happened in the summer, when she worked as a lifeguard.
A dermatologist biopsied the hives.
“It’s like a hole punch,” she says of the procedure to take samples of her hives. “The worst part, really, was the healing, especially on your hands and your chin.”
Much to her dismay, the biopsies did not yield answers.
“Once we did those and those were kind of inconclusive, we moved on to testing chemicals,” she says. “And, you know, doing the full panel of testing to see what may be triggering that.”
What does a skin patch test for allergies involve? You can expect to have small amounts of potential allergens applied to your skin, usually on your back.
How accurate are at-home allergy kit tests? It varies, but science doesn’t back up many of the mail-away allergy tests out there.
How do I know if I have allergies? Allergies can cause a variety of symptoms, from rashes and itching to swelling and breathing problems.
Skin patch test: Scary or helpful?
The biopsies were painful, but the skin patch test sounded as if it would be much more of an ordeal, Tayler says.
“I went back to dermatology, and they explained I can’t shower for a week,” she says. “They told me I’ll have a grid on my back of these little boxes. And they’ll test me for like 100 things. You can’t use any lotions, and you can’t have any sun exposure. I had to make sure I stayed inside.”
She says she knew what to expect, and the negative aspects may scare some people.
“The main thing they really asked me is, ‘Was I OK with scarring?’” she says. “I think they were kind of hitting heavy on the key points to show you it’s a really uncomfortable procedure for an extended period of time.”
She elected to have the grid applied to her back. “They basically tape it to your back,” she says. In each square on the grid, the dermatologist applied a different allergen or chemical designed to provoke a reaction from someone with an allergy to that material. The marks in the grid look like pinpricks, and Tayler says they’re caused by the testing materials.
The itching began as soon as she left the office.
“I was very, very cranky,” she says. “I cried the whole way home because I was already having reactions. And I was like, ‘I don’t know what I’ve gotten myself into. I don’t know why I did this.’ I was very angry and upset because it’s so uncomfortable. And you can’t take it off. It’s stuck on you.”
Tayler wore the grid for 2 days and went back to have it removed. The dermatologist circled problem spots and took notes on her back about the reactions.
“Some will just be lightly pink, and some may be very inflamed — like swollen, raised high,” she says. “It was really easy to tell, once they took the patch off, what I was already reacting to. And they documented that.”
Tayler had five or six more reactions. But that wasn’t the end. She was sent home without the grid to see if there were any reactions. She still could not shower. And she was itchy — very itchy.
“You cannot scratch under any circumstances,” Tayler says. “They expressed that to me so much.”
Two days later, she returned for her results.
“They gave me this big, big packet, like a big novel,” she says. “It listed the items I’m allergic to. And it gives you the products that have those items, which I thought was really cool. There was a list of makeup products to avoid, skin care products, cleaning supplies — anything you can imagine that would have those ingredients. They also list alternatives you can use in place of the more well-known brands.”
Some of the things she was allergic to were ingredients in her sunscreens.
“I switched, and it helped with inflammation,” she says.
End of the skin patch test is not the end of her ordeal
Tayler’s hives did not completely go away. They were under control in the winter and spring but flourished again the next summer.
“I’m actually allergic to the sun,” the former lifeguard says. “I have a condition that we found out through this process that is called solar urticaria. It was a big kind of scratch-your-head thing, just because, living in rural Kentucky, you don’t hear about that. I think they said less than 1% of the population has the condition I do.”
Tayler discovered her condition through complex photo testing using UVB and UVA light. Interestingly, the condition did not show up until she was 20 years old.
“The sun’s hard to hide from,” she says.
She spent the next 2 years experimenting with medications. Complicating matters, she couldn’t use certain sunscreens because they contained the allergens uncovered in her skin patch test. She has been symptom free since summer 2023.
The relief of knowing outweighs the cons of a skin patch test
Even though the skin patch test did not uncover Tayler’s condition, she still recommends it.
“You’re going to find out something, especially if you’re already having some type of large reaction and you want that relief, no matter what you have to do,” she says.
The big con to the test, she says, is the itching.
“It is very itchy, and it’s very uncomfortable — extremely, extremely uncomfortable. That’s the only bad thing about it,” Tayler says. “It was a really rough week, just because you want to scratch and you’re not supposed to scratch at all.”
The other con is not being able to shower, she says.
“You can sponge bath,” she says. “I would just sponge bath and take a sink bath. I love to be clean, and so I just felt so gross. I was miserable.”
But it lasted only a week and was completely outweighed by determining what she was allergic to, she says.
“Either way, you’ll find out something,” Tayler says. “You’ll find out that, ‘Hey, I’m not allergic to anything chemical-wise or product-wise.’ Which is awesome; that’s great news. Or B, ‘I’m allergic to XYZ,’ and you know you need to change your lifestyle.”
Why trust our experts?
