Gluten Free and Allergen Free Expo to be Held in Chicago

Living Without, a magazine for people with celiac disease, gluten sensitivity and food allergies, has become the title sponsor of the 4th annual Gluten & Allergen Free Expo, to be held April 29 - May 1 in Chicago.

Editor of Living Without, Alicia Woodward says “This Expo features a variety of experts, valuable information about great tasting specialty products, cooking and baking tips, recipes, and much more.”



More than 70 vendors will showcase their products.  Attendees can sit in on cooking and baking classes taught by well-respected chefs, nutritionists and cookbook authors to learn tips for preparing gluten free/allergen free meals and snacks.  Participants will enjoy lively presentations, taste recipes and have the opportunity to ask questions and interact with experts.

The Expo also features a designated nut-free area, kids’ activities and performers, and a special allergen-friendly cooking class for children.

For registration information, hotel deals and to sign up for e-mail notices, visit the Gluten and Allergen Free Expo site.

Anyone already registered or planning to attend?

Health Bloggers Can Earn a Little Extra Something

WEGO Health is a different kind of social media company whose mission is to empower the top 10% of online health social media contributors to connect with each other and with healthcare companies. They call these people Health Activists. Food Allergy Assistant is one of them.

WEGO Health is setting up an Insight Panel (online focus group) for parents who blog about family health, nutrition, parenting and more. I’ve already signed up, but I wanted to make sure that all of you knew about the opportunity as well. The Insight Panel will last about an hour and all participants will receive a $25 Amazon.com gift card for their participation. They’re still scheduling the actual Panel, but WEGO wanted to start sharing this with people now.

If you’re interested in participating in this Panel (or one like it) and want to see if you’re a good fit, take their brief survey here: Parents Who Blog about Health Insight Panel!

Food Allergy Conferences Begin This Week-end

FAAN (Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network) is kicking off their conferences in Baltimore this Saturday, April 2. On April 16, the Chicago conference is scheduled in Oak Brook Illinois and the west coast conference will be in Anaheim California on June 11. In 2012, the Baltimore (east coast) conference will be in Tarrytown NY, so you may want to plan accordingly.

I have found these conferences to be helpful during our food allergy journey. The speakers range from doctors sharing new treatment and research information to teens talking about how they deal with food allergies every day. At lunch, attendees sit with "their zip code" in order to meet people who live close to you. Discussion of local schools and support groups often takes place during this meal.

There are special sessions for teens (ages 11-18), school nurses and adults with food allergy. Other sessions focus on 504 plans and preparing allergy-friendly foods.

Check out the schedule and consider whether a FAAN conference may help you better deal with food allergy this year.

Camp for Children With Food Allergies

Have you worried that your food allergic child won't be able to participate in typical kid activitites like summer camp? FAAN has just announced registration for Camp TAG. These specially designed half day camps are "95% fun and 5% educational". Children ages 3-12 will be grouped by age and participate in activities including camp games, arts and crafts, boating, mini-golf and more.

There are three locations for the summer of 2011:

• Joliet Park District in Joliet IL
• Tall Pines Day Camp in Williamstown NJ
• Sandy Springs Friends School near Gaithersburg MD

TAG stands for The Allergy Gang and this camp experience may help kids with food allergies feel a connection to others who deal with food allergy every day.

Check out the registration page for more information.

Your family may want to consider a summer vacation around Camp TAG. Williamstown NJ is an easy distance to all the sights of Philadelphia. Gaithersburg Maryland is just outside of Washington DC and Joliet Illinois is 45 miles from Chicago.

Food Allergy Presentations at Annual Conference in San Francisco

The American Academy of Allergy Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI) just wrapped up their annual conference in San Francisco. As always, many presentations addressed food allergy. I always look forward to information from this conference as we get the latest research and data.  Here are a few highlights:

In New Research Continues to Give Hope for Outgrowing Milk Allergy, researchers report that the median age for outgrowing milk allergy is two years of age.  Factors that may best predict the potential resolution of milk allergy include  lower milk IgE, a smaller wheal from the prick skin test and mild-none versus moderate-severe atopic dermatitis.

The presentation, When It Comes to Certain Allergies, Birth Order Matters, revealed that the incidence of food allergy decreased significantly as birth order increased. This would seem to indicate that your firstborn, or older children are more likely to have food allergies. While not the case in our family, this may give some relief to parents of food allergic children who want to have more children.

Children with More Severe Eczema Less Likely to Outgrow Milk, Egg Allergy gave information suggesting that child with no, or mild, atopic dermatitis were more likely to outgrow their egg or milk allergies.  


A presentation, Could Rural Environment Protect Against Food Allergy? showed that rural areas do seem to have less food allergy than urban areas. The next step, researchers say, is to find out what factors seem to provide this protection.


  

Lawsuit Against Chinese Restaurant After Peanut Allergy Death

Remember the tragic story last year of the 7th grader who died after eating Chinese food served at a class party? Katelyn Carlson had a known peanut allergy and suffered an anaphylactic reaction to Chinese food brought into school for a party. Teachers say they told the restaurant of the peanut allergy. The food was later tested and found to contain peanut protein.

 

A recent news article about the lawsuit is creating another divide in our society that reminds me of the recent controversy in a Florida school. I hate to see the finger pointing and the blame. It's time that everyone accepts that food allergies are part of our society and that we all, food allergic or not, need to deal with it. Adults need to protect children with food allergies and laws need to protect food allergic children and adults.

 

I know- not as simple as it sounds, but it's time to end the blame game and for us all to act as Good Samaritans and help one another. Those of us closely related to food allergy need to continue to educate others about what having a food allergy means. Everyone else needs to open their minds and hearts and step up to do what is right.

Stories like these also serve as a reminder to those of us with food allergic kids:

• Make sure they always have access to an Epipen.
• Create a 504 plan with your school.
• Teach children how to stand up for themselves and take control of their own food allergy.

I don't know any details of the Carlson case. I do know it is tragic that a child died of a food allergy reaction.

Food Allergy Detective App Offers Clues

Diagnosing food allergies requires some detective work. Anyone who thinks they have food allergies or food sensitivities should certainly consult a doctor, however there is some work you can do before and after seeing the doctor. While skin and blood tests may provide some clues, keeping track of what you eat and how you feel after you eat provides valuable evidence.

Fortunately, there's an app for that. Enter Tim, a good husband who wanted to help his wife as she struggled to figure out her food allergies and sensitivities. He created the Food Allergy Detective App, which can be used on an iPhone, iPod Touch or an iPad. Tim asked me to try it out to see if my blog readers might be interested in this tool.

We're currently doing some of our own detective work with my child's allergies. We've got an Excel® spreadsheet with a list of foods and we're recording any symptoms. The paper is getting pretty messy with our arrows, highlights and scribbles. I decided to enter it into Food Allergy Detective App through my iPad.

Here's what I like about this app. The eight top allergens are already listed, but it was very easy for me to go in and add categories I specifically needed like, "almonds" and "baked milk". From there, I could drill down further and document "1 baked egg in 24 cookies". This precision is important to me as we investigate my child's reactions to specific foods.

The app then allows you to record any symptoms that occurred after ingesting the food. Everything from abdominal pain to hives is already listed. Additional symptoms can be added. Now, the cool part is the app actually analyzes the data and lets you know if any patterns emerge.
Very convenient.

My sloppy charts work fine, but this app is much neater and has the added feature of organizing the data into patterns. If you are struggling with physical symptoms that seem to be related to the foods you eat, the Food Allergy Detective app may be just the tool to help you figure out the foods causing your symptoms.

For more information, check out Food Allergy Detective.

Food Allergy Awareness

Check out these great videos on PIX11. They are talking about all things food allergy this week on their morning show. Watch to see everything from how restaurants are becoming more allergy aware to a demonstration of how to handle an allergic reaction. You'll see Sloane Miller talk about her new food allergy book and you'll hear 7 year old Ronaldo talk about his food allergies. They also provide an update on current research.

What a great way to introduce food allergies and to raise awareness about them!

Food Allergy Book By Allergic Girl Sloane Miller

Allergic Girl: Adventures in Living Well with Food Allergies

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Hopeful.

That's how I felt reading Sloane Miller's new book, Allergic Girl: Adventures in Living Well With Food Allergies. Sloane is an adult who is living just fine with her food allergies.

For those of us who have food allergic children, once we get past the shock of the initial diagnosis, our brains turn to, "how do you live like this?". Then we kick it in gear. We find the recipes, we corral the medicines, eventually we interview preschools and then initiate 504 meetings for our food allergic school-age kids. Underneath all of that, though, I couldn't help but wonder how my child was going to navigate though all this as he got older (translation: when he didn't have his loving parents watching everything he put in his mouth).

• Would he ever be able to go out for pizza with friends?
• What about dating?
•  How could he go away to college?
• Would he be able to take a trip without the meticulous planning I do before every family vacation?
• Will he be safe when I am no longer responsible for his food allergies?

This book reveals a path. There is a way to live safely with food allergies. I like the concepts Sloane puts forth, like "having a safety person" and "team you". She takes us through the grief process that often accompanies a food allergy diagnosis. She tells us how she navigates things like going off to college, attending weddings, dining out and traveling.

If you are an adult struggling with your food allergies, or a parent anxious about your child's food allergies, I encourage you to pick up a copy of this book. It's a bowlful of information, blended with a spoonful of fun and then covered with a generous dollop of hope.

It's delicious!

New Flu Vaccines Safe for Egg Allergic

The 2009 swine flu scare has had an unexpected benefit for the food allergy community. On March 1, the US Department of Health and Human Services announced contracts with two companies to manufacture flu vaccine. The 2009 swine flu pandemic proved that companies were unable to meet the demand for vaccine quickly enough using traditional egg-based methods of production.

Novavax and VaxInnate are the manufacturers of these next-generation recombinant influenza vaccines. Novavax is to develop new technology to produce vaccines using insect cells to express influenza proteins and create virus-like particles that stimulate a strong immune response in humans.VaxInnate is developing a recombinant influenza vaccine technology based on combining influenza and bacteria proteins to stimulate strong immune response to protect against the flu.
People will be able to get the vaccine earlier in the season and these new vaccines by-pass the guessing game of which strain of the virus should be in the vaccine.

I'll keep you posted on more information as it is released.

Finally, egg allergic kids and adults won't have to weight the risk of their allergy against the risk of getting the flu!