Allergic diseases are prevalent throughout the world. Over the past century, research in the causes and mechanisms of allergic diseases has utilized increasingly sophisticated scientific techniques. This information provides physicians the knowledge and tools to accurately diagnose and effectively manage allergies with minimal disruption of their patients' daily lives. Unfortunately, the sheer number of patients with allergy and the chronic nature of the diseases attract a few practitioners who use unconventional methods of diagnosis and treatment. Although such practices may be called alternative or complementary to conventional practices, these terms are clearly misnomers, since they neither substitute for nor add to proven therapies that are based on scientific evidence.

This article discusses those forms of specific allergen immunotherapy that are controversial by virtue of unconventional and unproved methodology. In most cases, they are based on unscientific theories.