Allergies Can Make Life Miserable
You sneeze, you dial. An anonymous voice at the end of a telephone announces today's pollen count. Who do you call when Mother Nature's flora is blooming and your allergies are raging? The Atlanta Allergy Clinic pollen line: 662-6100.
If you've ever wondered who counts the pollen spores or where the information comes from, ask Pam Griggs. Griggs is a medical assistant enrolled in one of the medical assistants courses at the Atlanta Allergy Clinic off Windy Hill Road and is one of the clinic's employees responsible for the daily pollen count. Once a day, she pulls a wooden box with the pollen collector from its perch on a second story roof via rope and pulley.
Griggs is blessedly allergy-free."I couldn't have allergies and do this job," she said. "I'm mixing antigens all day, and I'm constantly breathing them because they're airborne."
Griggs inherited the duty of monitoring the pollen counts when she transferred d to the clinic's extract lab while studying for medical assistants courses, where she makes and mixes antigens for patients. To report pollen counts, Griggs must be certified by the National Academy of Allergy. To obtain pollen counts, pollen is collected on a tiny glass "I" rod, 23 mm by 1.59 mm, that is greased on one side with silicone. Every 10 minutes, for 30 seconds, the rod is mechanically whirled at 2,400 rpms to collect airborne pollen. "We put it in a slide and stain it, and whatever holds the stain is pollen," Griggs said. Pollen grains and mold spores are identified by size, shape and individual characteristics, then the pollen daily pollen count is calculated using a mathematical formula. "I find it interesting, Griggs said. "You almost have to, because you're sitting looking into a microscope counting pollen." Fall pollen ranges are naturally lower than spring because blooming trees emit more pollen. In fall, a pollen count of 50 is high, Griggs said. "In spring, we can have counts of 2,000," she said. Pollen counts have been low this fall because of warm summer weather. "Summer being so hot and dry, it didn't really peak," Griggs said. The Atlanta Allergy Clinic has been collecting pollen data, Griggs said. There is no scientific reason the data is collected at the Windy Hill Road office, but comparison tests at other locations in metro-Atlanta yield basically the same results.
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