No Child Left Behind....Let's Hope!

If you are familiar with the Edgewater Elementary story and are interested in supporting the allergic girl and her family, there is now a support page on Facebook and a mass e-mailing campaign is planned for this coming Monday, March 28. Please show your support by joining the group. There is not much else we can do for them right now.

The 2011 American Academy of Allergy Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) Annual Meeting

The American Academy of Allergy Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) Annual Meeting is currently underway in San Francisco. Food allergies are, of course, among the many topics that are being discussed. I have been following the #AAAAI hashtag, @utahallergy, and @allergistmommy (she is a must-follow, by the way) on Twitter and thought I'd share some of the things I learned.

• Sensitization alone is not sufficient for diagnosis of food allergy. Diagnosis should be based on a combination of sensitization (blood tests) and clinical symptoms.
• There is insufficient evidence to recommend dietary modification/restrictions from allergens during pregnancy. In high risk food allergy families, peanut may be a notable exception.
• Peanut and sesame oils may contain trace amounts of protein (depending on how they are processed), so should be avoided.
• Those who tolerate baked milk are more likely to outgrow their allergy, and faster than those who don't.
• Approximately 75% of children with food allergy will tolerate heated egg or milk.
• As moms, we do our very best for our children. Please never blame yourself for child's allergy. INCREDIBLY complicated. (I particularly appreciated this comment since I keep asking myself what I could have done better/different to prevent my child's allergies.)

There are many more on Twitter. I have mentioned only a few to give you an idea of the valuable content you can find there.

Flying Delta With A Peanut Allergy

After much consideration and many hours of research on the internet, we decided to take our allergic 3 year-old son on a trip to Hawaii. He is allergic to too many foods to list here. Suffice it to say that he is anaphylactic to peanuts.

Due to various circumstances, we had to fly Delta. Unlike United, Continental, and American Airlines (click to read about their peanut allergy policy), Delta still serves packaged peanuts on their flights. After reading their policy in regard to peanut allergy, we called two weeks in advance and notified them about our son's special needs. The agent we spoke to confirmed the guidelines, entered our son's medical info in their computers, and recommended we notify the gate agents before boarding.

Which is exactly what we did. In addition to this precaution, I boarded every one of the four planes we took a few minutes before my son boarded, so I could wipe down the seat carefully and inspect the area around it. That proved to be a good idea, because two out of four flight segments, I found peanuts on the floor.

An hour into the second flight (SLC-HNL), the flight attendants started serving refreshments. We spoke to them, too, and informed them about our son's allergy. They said they had no idea, the gate agents had not communicated the information to them. So they offered the buffer zone, per airline policy. Unfortunately, they forgot about it when they came around a second time. The flight attendant I had spoken to directly offered peanuts to the passenger seated right in front of me, who kindly reminded her about the boy with peanut allergy. The other flight attendant offered peanuts to my husband, seated next to my son. I was outraged at the time, but in retrospect I wonder if the flight attendants made mistakes because of poor communication or insufficient training in regard to peanut allergies.

On our way back, it proved to be a bit simpler since we took a red-eye out of HNL. People don't snack too much (if at all) at night. The flight attendant appreciated that we let her know, because once again the gate agent had not mentioned anything about my son. We were guaranteed the buffer zone and this time they took it seriously.

Overall, it was stressful experience but I'm happy to report that our son did OK. The last two hours of the SLC-HNL flight, he coughed incessantly. As soon as he got off the plane though, he felt fine. I don't know if he reacted to peanut dust or just poor air quality on the plane.

What I learned form this experience:

- Communicate. A lot. With the airline before the flight, with the gate agents, and with the flight attendants AS SOON as you get on the plane.

- Clean the seat and the surrounding area. It takes a few good minutes to do a thorough job, since the seats are unbelievably dirty. Any type of wet wipes will do (thanks Jenny Kales, who kindly enlightened me about this). I used Huggies baby wipes and it took 5-6 wipes each time (for my son's seat, the back of the seat in front of him, and the window area).

- Airplane seat covers are available for purchase from Plane Sheets. I have not purchased one yet, and I'm afraid they might not work on all airplanes. We flew a Boeing 767 with entertainment screens on the back of the seats. A seat sheet might partially cover the screen of the person behind you.

- Have various safe snacks. Plan on more than you think is enough. It's amazing how kids can get an appetite at the most unexpected times, especially when bored on a plane.

- If you have an airplane-approved car seat and it is not too inconvenient to bring it aboard, do it. We had ours on a previous (shorter) flight to California and the stress levels were way lower. It is familiar, it is clean, and the child can't easily unbuckle and hop off to explore the airplane floor. As big and bulky as ours is (we have a Britax Roundabout), I would bring ours again.

- Vacation in places that require shorter flights for less stress and increased security. 4 hours to California (including layover) vs. 11 hours to Hawaii (again, with layover)? As much as I love Hawaii, I'd choose California in a heartbeat. At least if you need an emergency landing in case of anaphylaxis, it can be done.