Food Allergies for Dummies

by Robert A. Wood

Book Overview

Are you constantly worrying about what you or your loved ones eat? Is every dining experience an episode of anxiety for you? Being allergic to different types of food not only ruins the experience of eating, it can lead to dangerous, sometimes lethal, consequences.

With Food Allergies for Dummies, you can feel safer about what you eat. This concise guide shows you how to identify and avoid food that triggers reactions. This guide covers...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0470095849
• ISBN13: 9780470095843
• Release Date: April 2007
• Publisher: For Dummies
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 1.32 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 7.4" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Informative and well-written

From the start of this book, I felt like I was sitting down for a one-on-one conversation with Dr. Wood. Having a severe peanut allergy himself, he offers a unique and very personal perspective not found in publications by other doctors. This book came along at the perfect time for us - with our oldest food-allergic child on the brink of entering public school, I am especially grateful for the practical information and advice in that arena. This book is down-to-earth enough to serve as a starting point for food allergy "newbies", and well-organized enough to serve as a reference for us "veterans". I would recommend it to anyone affected by food allergies.

Great Addition to My Food Allergy Library

I am also a co-leader of a food allergy support group. I have read a lot of books on food allergies as well as have had a lot of great speakers come to our meetings addressing food allergies. I find this book to be one of the best available. It is very resourceful and easy to use and easy to understand. It covers a wide range of topics. There is information on testing, avoidance, sending your child to school with food allergies, alternative treatments, etc. I am glad to finally find a book that covers it all. You won't be disappointed with this one.

Amazing Resource

Fantastic! This book is purely an amazing resource for everyone: parents, care givers, friends and families and most of all, the person with food allergies. As a parent of a food allergic child, I've spent the last 6 years learning everything on my own, via FAAN and other resources. This book sums it up in one fell swoop! The authors cover what issues and challenges exist, how to understand them and most of all...how to live successfully with food allergies. Information is clearly defined in lay terms and organized for quick review. Food Allergies, as a disease, is new to many physicians and this book helps explains details that doctors haven't dealt with yet, are unfamiliar with, or simply do not have the time to cover in a visit; such as various testing, managing school, reading labels, risk assessment, etc. The Food Label Crib Sheet is must for all beginners too! My local food allergy parent education group is in the process of purchasing this book for each school nurse within our school district (68,000 students) after they discovered that the head nurse felt this book would be a vital resource for her staff and parents, but didn't have the funding for the purchase. I have a feeling this book will soon become common recommendation for people beginning on the path of successful living with Food Allergies.

Grateful to have found this book

If you read just 1 book about food allergies, make it this one. This book is my food allergy bible. Why? 1. It is comprehensive without being overwhelming. By this, I mean it covers a lot and it does so in an empowering way; you don't finish the book (or even a chapter) feeling paralyzed. You leave with information to make decisions about how you want to deal food allergies as they affect you, a family member, a friend, etc. 2. It is nice to see so much key information presented in one place. I tried obtaining the same information from other publications and websites. I could not find it all (I am not sure most of it exists elsewhere) - and I had to hunt all over the place to collect the golden nuggets that I could find. 3. I love that everything is presented in layman's terms - not the "medical speak" one finds in medical journals or research papers/studies (which clearly have value, but, for an "average Joe" like me, can be difficult to muddle through). 4. The authors present specific information - with details and quantitative references/benchmarks rather than generalizations. For example, they provide percentages about how likely one is to outgrow a particular food allergy, how likely one is to have a child with a food allergy (if you have an allergic disease) or another child with a food allergy (if you are a parent with one food allergic child already), etc. The information provided is also very practical; it takes into account that food allergic people do not live in a plastic bubble and talks about ways to deal with "everyday situations" (including social situations) as well as emergencies. 5. The book answers questions that you would ask if you had unlimited time with your own allergist or with Dr. Wood himself. So, do not worry if you cannot get an appointment with Dr. Wood (arguably the nation's leading authority on food allergies and asthma); in a sense, this book brings him to you. Topics cover everything you would expect, including the pros and cons associated with RAST testing and skin testing; how some allergies tend to travel together; hidden sources of allergens; promising research; challenges associated with day care and school environments (along with recommendations on how to deal with them).

From someone who "gets it"

I have been leading an allergy support group,volunteering with non-profit organizations, writing a newsletter and raising a child with food allergies for the past six years, so I really felt like I had seen and read it all. However this book is a most welcome addition to my food allergy collection, in fact, it's on top! If you are just starting out on this journey, you will have all of your questions answered and answers for those that you dont even know to ask. If, like me, you've been at this for awhile, you will get more detail, all of the latest research, facts and figures and even some of the rationale behind decisions that our doctors make. Of particular interest to me was the information on outgrowing food allergies, a whole chapter on peanuts, and one on potential cures and current research. Best of all, in my view, are some of the personal stories from Dr Wood. When you hear the stories, of someone who has been there and also see that you can survive and thrive even with life-threatening food allergies, you cant help but finish the book with a sense of hope and confidence. After my husband spent some time reading this yesterday said, "This book sure isnt for dummies!" Sincerely, Gina