Welcome to Episode 6 of the Allergy mom podcast an interview with Daniel Zakowski, founder of Ready. Set. Food!

• Clinical research shows we can prevent up to 80% of allergies from developing in the first place through following a protocol of early allergen introduction (Examples of studies that support this include:  The LEAP (Learning Early about Peanut) studyfocused on giving small amounts of peanuts to babies frequently and on an on-going basis; the PETIT (Two-step egg introduction for prevention of egg allergy in high-risk infants with eczema) trial – looking at egg introduction, and the EAT (Enquiry About Tolerance) trial – multiple different allergenic foods (peanut, egg, milk, sesame, fish and wheat) introduced early in a child’s diet to determine possible prevention of food allergies. 
• Challenge is how to feed babies multiple allergens on a regular basis – there was a need to support parents in making this easier to follow the evidence of how to prevent 80% of these food allergies – that’s how Ready. Set. Food! was created and the idea was born to find a bottle-feeding solution to introducing food allergens to infants.
• Early allergen introduction is recommended at 4 months for now – hasn’t been studied for earlier yet so at this point this is the recommended time. 
• According to U.S. guidelines, Pre-screening is recommended if your child has eczema or other diagnosed allergies before introducing allergens. In other countries there is not this recommendation. Even if you have a family history of food allergies, they are still advocating for early introduction of allergens apart from the recommendations for pre-screening above in the U.S. The reason for that being that severe eczema is a warning sign for development of food allergies. 
• Delaying introduction of allergens to infants is the worst thing according to their findings.  This is a complete 180 from the advice I was given when my children were infants! 
• Recent research entitled “Age Differences in Food Reaction Severity During Oral Food Challenges in a Large Pediatric Population” retrieved from: (https://www.jacionline.org/article/S0091-6749(19)31863-9/fulltext) shares the findings Daniel speaks about in this interview that EVERY MONTH YOU WAIT poses increased risks for more severe reactions and that babies generally have more mild reactions. This research supports his suggestions that the earlier introduction the better for introducing allergens to your child. 
• The Allergy Mom, Ready. Set. Food! and other partners have partnered up to support the launch of PreventAllergies.org – a non-branded website created as a separate resource to support doctors in providing education about food allergy prevention.
• Continued exposure to allergens is key to maintaining the preventative effects of early introduction of food allergens in preventing food allergies and maintaining tolerance throughout a person’s life.

That is Episode 6! Thanks for listening! Check out Ready. Set. Food’s website as well as PreventAllergies.org – which I have been happy to partner with to share the important research being done about preventing allergies in children.