The theory was that your body would build up a natural resistance to the grass pollen. So they start off very low dosage and gradually increase the dosage of grass pollen in your system, until your body was able to fight the reaction by itself. For me, I definitely noticed an improvement in my symptoms. Although it was a double-blind randomised controlled trial, I think it’s called, so nobody knew who was getting what, I was pretty certain from the outset that I was getting injected with grass pollen because I was getting a local reaction to every injection. My husband wasn’t getting a reaction, so we kind of guessed that he probably wasn’t on the grass pollen injection. And at the end of the study, when they announced the results to us and told us whether we were or were not on the grass pollen and it was confirmed that he was on the placebo, they did offer for him to go through the process again, to receive grass pollen injections, go through the whole process but obviously without having to keep the diary, just so he could gain benefit. Because it was shown to be of benefit.
Did [the research nurse] ever say anything about your suspicions that you were on it and that your husband wasn’t on it?
I think it’s very difficult to sort of avoid it, because to me it was so obvious that I was receiving the grass pollen just because of the reaction I was getting. But he always said, “Of course I couldn’t possibly comment.” Sort of made a joke of it. But I think we both knew that I was clearly on it.
