Friday December 22, 2006 found at citynews.ca

If you're a conscientious shopper and carefully check the tags and think you're safe purchasing a piece that claims to be hypoallergenic, you'll need to think again.

"Hypoallergenic is really a made up marketing term," Sandy Skotnicki-Grant, medical director of the Bay Dermatology Centre said. "What you want to look for is something that says nickel-free."

Skotnicki-Grant says hypoallergenic doesn't mean nickel-free.

And you shouldn't always rely on salespeople to give you accurate information about the contents of costume jewelry.

CityNews asked one clerk to define hypoallergenic and she replied: "Hypoallergenic means they've taken the nickel out of it."

It's also a good idea to look for lead-free jewelry, and stay away from metals with no label at all.

"The same thing that's in snaps on bras or on the snaps on your belt buckle ... this is just cheap metal," Skotnicki-Grant said.

And when it comes to more expensive metals, you'll want to stick to 18k gold or higher, sterling silver, platinum, and stainless surgical steel.

"It's an alloy of nickel...you're probably safe with this though because with an alloy they are all tightly bound together, so you shouldn't have any release of nickel," Skotnicki-Grant explained.