Not everyone appreciates fragrances (or perspiration)

My wife and I were recently making an online reservation at a bed & breakfast place for a brief trip we're going to take this summer, and I noticed that the B&B's web site said that they are a "fragrance-free zone" and that they request that guests not wear any aftershaves, colognes, or perfumes while staying there. For some reason that reminded me of a patient I had in my allergy medical practice years ago who claimed that she was allergic to her husband. She said that even being in the same room with him for longer than a few minutes caused her to have coughing and shortness of breath, episodes that had been worsening for a couple years. After eliminating the possibility of reactions to his personal care items such as aftershaves and to his clothing, and after making sure he did not have any apparent transmissible infectious diseases, I had him exercise vigorously by walking up and down the stairs outside my office. Then I harvested some of his sweat by scraping it gently into a test tube and used it to concoct a skin test solution. Lo and behold, upon skin test challenges with the solution, his wife quickly developed itchy redness and swelling at the test sites. (Fortunately she had no respiratory symptoms.) Subsequently I was able to make serial dilutions of the test solution, which were then used for subcutaneous injections over a period of 2 months to desensitize her to whatever it was in his perspiration that was causing her reactions.

After that she was able not only to be in the same room with him indefinitely, but also to sleep in the same bed with him again. But that's another story....

My wife and I were recently making an online reservation at a bed & breakfast place for a brief trip we're going to take this summer, and I noticed that the B&B's web site said that they are a "fragrance-free zone" and that they request that guests not wear any aftershaves, colognes, or perfumes while staying there.  For some reason that reminded me of a patient I had in my allergy medical practice years ago who claimed that she was allergic to her husband.  She said that even being in the same room with him for longer than a few minutes caused her to have coughing and shortness of breath, episodes that had been worsening for a couple years.  After eliminating the possibility of reactions to his personal care items such as aftershaves and to his clothing, and after making sure he did not have any apparent transmissible infectious diseases, I had him exercise vigorously by walking up and down the stairs outside my office.  Then I harvested some of his sweat by scraping it gently into a test tube and used it to concoct a skin test solution.  Lo and behold, upon skin test challenges with the solution, his wife quickly developed itchy redness and swelling at the test sites.  (Fortunately she had no respiratory symptoms.)  Subsequently I was able to make serial dilutions of the test solution, which were then used for subcutaneous injections over a period of 2 months to desensitize her to whatever it was in his perspiration that was causing her reactions.

After that she was able not only to be in the same room with him indefinitely, but also to sleep in the same bed with him again.  But that's another story....

I love it!

Can you perform that same sort of desensitization for people allergic to The Veg?

This explains my new outlook on manual labor in my late adult life.

Wow! What a story, John!

I’ve heard of something like this before. For many of us, it would have been easy to dismiss this as some kind of mental issue (perhaps hypochondria). Very nice to hear that you were able to find a solution and help this couple.

That's very interesting, John.  It's great that you were able to resolve the issue for your patient!

Now, what I would like to know:  did you reserve a room at a different B&B so you can use those nice vintage aftershaves during your trip?

Now, what I would like to know:  did you reserve a room at a different B&B so you can use those nice vintage aftershaves during your trip?

Hah. No, we went ahead and booked there. I'll just do without the aftershave for the two days - or maybe I'll keep a bottle in the car glove box and apply a splash on our way out for a day's activities.

That's a crazy situation. Props for figuring that out and very cool story. Interesting take from the B&B as well. You don't think of things like that typically, or at least I don't, but I understand why they do it.

That's a crazy situation. Props for figuring that out and very cool story. Interesting take from the B&B as well. You don't think of things like that typically, or at least I don't, but I understand why they do it.

Yes, I've heard of such restrictions before but hadn't run into one. While I was practicing allergy medicine, I was unable to wear aftershaves to work because of patients who reacted to them, usually with eye, nose, throat, or lung symptoms, but occasionally with rashes. Most of them thought they had allergies, but testing almost never showed any "true" allergy (prior sensitization). Apparently they were just genetically hypersensitive to some constituent of the product or to the fragrance itself. Many doctors incorrectly thought this was psychosomatic (imaginary) or psychiatric illness, just as many in the past thought the same of chronic fatigue syndrome .