USA Today reports that as the allergy epidemic grows, more allergy sufferers are seeking out alternative medicine treatments. Despite the growing popularity of alternative treatments, most members of the medical community are still skeptical.

‘When a patient asks me whether they should try alternative or herbal medicine, I counsel that it generally won't be harmful, but it's not likely to be beneficial either,’ says Dr. Brian Smart, an allergist from Illinois, ‘And they should carefully watch for side effects.’

A widely publicized study that appeared in The New England Journal of Medicine in July concluded that echinacea