What is Fragrance Mix Allergy?

The other thing my patch test showed was an allergy to the two fragrance mixes they use. Apparently a lot of people diagnosed with a Balsam of Peru allergy also test positive for fragrances too.

Yet again the best information I found was on the DermNZ website here. This site is extremely helpful, it seems that the components of the Fragrance mixes are:

Cinnamic alcohol 
This smells like hyacinth and is a natural fragrance found in cinnamon leaves, propolis oil, and hyacinth oil. You can find this in most toiletries and in chewing gums and cola drinks, vermouth & bitters.

Cinnamic aldehyde
This smells and tastes of cinnamon, and is actually a part of cinnamon oil.

Eugenol
Smells strongly of clove, is found in oils of cinnamon leaf and clove. Can also be found in carnations, roses, violets & hyacinths. Which pretty much means that wearing a perfume/cologne is pretty much out unless you do a ton of research.

Isoeugenol
Another clove smell, and is a part of ylang ylang and nutmeg oils .

Geraniol
Smells like roses and comprises of large parts of citronella, jasmine, lavender, geranium, palmarose and rose oils. And is in a ton of essential oils.

Alpha amyl cinnamic alcohol
Smells strongly of jasmine and is in lot of synthetic essential oils. So if you're an essential oil user, this and the above make using them a whole lot more complicated.

Hydroxycintronellal
Smells like lily of the valley and is also in synthetic fragrances.

Oak Moss absolute
This smells woody and is an essential oil produced by the solvent extraction of tree lichen. And is used in lots of scented mens products.


Pretty much everything here is in personal care products and perfumes/colognes (well they are fragrances :)) So, at first we'll spend a lot of time in supermarkets reading product labels.
I think I spent about 2 hours in Sainsburys looking at every personal care product. I found only 5 items that I could use! And this was a large Sainsburys too, so quite a large selection.

As this is all still new to me, I find that I have to carry printouts of all my allergy's components around with me - there's just so many names to remember.