Last month, “The Food Allergy Book: What School Employees Need to Know, ” was released in English and Spanish. This book is free–my favorite type of deal for schools–and was written to help all school employees to understand their roles in managing students with life threatening food allergies in regards to prevention and responding to a true anaphylactic emergency. I downloaded the 36 page FREE (how many times can I emphasize this word?) booklet, which can be ordered in print as well.
Quickly getting to the point, “The Food Allergy Book: What School Employees Need to Know”, briefly covers…
[unordered_list style=”red-x”]- Basics: what is a food allergy, food intolerance, the major allergens, etc.
- How to identify reactions
- How a child might describe a reaction
- Responding to a reaction
- Managing food allergies from a school team approach
- Cafeteria and Nutrition services
- Food Allergy Management and Prevention Plans
- Emergency Care Plans
- Individual Health Plans
- 504 Plans
- Prevention: training of staff, students, label reading classroom environment, handwashing, cross contact, etc.
- Field trips, school buses,
Good job National Education Association Health Information Network (NEA HIN) partnering with the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) for offering up, for free, a very valuable and rich booklet regarding the roles of ALL school employees in the effective management of life threatening food allergies!
Please share this booklet with your teacher, school nurse and principal to use as guideline to insuring your child’s school is truly ready and able to manage your child’s life threatening food allergy!
One of the hardest things I find about managing both life threatening food allergies and asthma is talking to others. I hate to be the one that might be perceived as demanding, pushing or for asking too much. What I now know, fourteen years later, is that honest, clear information presented with kindness works!..