Q: [School-Aged] My daughter is so excited about her pot luck holiday party at school, her first big celebration in Kindergarten. The problem is parents are encouraged to bring in family favorites to celebrate their ancestral culture, and my daughter has food allergies. We haven’t had any serious reactions (anaphylaxis), but she definitely has sensitivities. How can I handle this?
A: As a father of five, I think the party sounds like a fantastic time. However, as an Allergist, with all of these different recipes it could also be a recipe for disaster for a child with food allergies.
Without knowing exactly what your child is allergic to it’s difficult to say exactly what to avoid. In children, the three most common food allergies are first milk, second egg, and finally peanuts. The good news is, most children outgrow both milk and egg allergy. However, most children do not outgrow peanut allergy or other nuts like tree nuts. Knowing that there are going to be multiple different types of foods at the party from multiple different cultures, there is a big risk that if your child is allergic they could get accidental exposure.
Accidental exposure can be quite dangerous and potentially lead to life-threatening reactions even though your child has never had a serious life-threatening reaction in the past. Studies have shown that repeated exposure leads to more severe reactions in patients that have significant food allergy. Therefore, patients should have strict food avoidance of whatever they are allergic to and ensure that they have epinephrine for injection at the ready in the event of accidental exposure.
Sending children with serious food allergies to school or kindergarten can be a very anxiety-provoking time in a parent’s life. It’s important if your child has food allergies that you have a food allergy action plan and you meet with the school and their teacher so everybody understands the seriousness of your child’s medical condition. In addition, it’s important that in the event of an accidental exposure there is a good treatment strategy in place to prevent or treat a potentially life-threatening reaction. Successfully transitioning your child into school requires forming a partnership between you and a team of key individuals that includes the school nurse, teachers, administrators, cafeteria staff, maintenance staff, transportation staff, coaches, other parents, and your child’s classmates. All of these individuals play a role in food allergy management.
Reading labels is one thing, you can see the ingredients and where the product was manufactured. This enables you to easily avoid accidental exposure to the foods that your child is allergic to. However, bringing home-cooked food into the classroom presents a unique challenge. Educating your child not to eat any food unless they are certain it doesn’t contain the food they are allergic to is very important.
My recommendations for the potluck would be to bring a delicious family recipe to share with everyone. I would first check with the school to see if there are other children that have food allergy and if there is anything that you need to avoid bringing to the event. Then, ensure that your child only consumes what you have actually prepared and brought. It’s important that we take into account the social stigma that food allergy brings to some children. Therefore, being able to participate in birthday parties, school or other events is very important for their socialization. However, their safety always has to be first and foremost. Finding the safe balance in this is very important for the health of your child.
Fortunately, we now have a new treatment for food allergies. Since peanut is the most common food allergy that persists in childhood, this is where the most research has been done. We now have the capability to desensitize peanut allergic children and adults such that accidental exposure of small amounts of peanut is tolerated without incident. This new and revolutionary therapy is changing the lives of families and children with food allergy. To find out more about this innovative therapy visit www.socalallergy.com and search for food allergy.
Warner W. Carr, M.D., FAAAAI, FACAAI, FACP, board-Certified: American Board Allergy & Immunology and American Board of Internal Medicine. Dr. Carr is affiliated with CHOC at Mission Hospital and cares for patients in 3 locations San Clemente, Mission Viejo and Irvine. www.socalallergy.com
Leave a Reply