Beyond a Peanut Allergy Flashcards
Nut Allergy Education for Parents, Kids, Teachers, Daycare Made Easy
"Beyond a Peanut" cards teach the vigilance to keep highly allergic children safe from anaphylactic reactions while at school, daycare, friends' homes or birthday parties
Anyone with food allergies knows how difficult it can be to avoid common food ingredients such as sugar, wheat flour, eggs, or dairy. But how much harder is it for those whose anaphylactic allergies to peanuts or other nuts threaten not only their comfort and health, but their life? Dina Clifford, creator of the "Beyond a Peanut" educational flashcards, learned just how scary allergies can be when her son had a biphasic anaphylactic reaction after taking a bite of a peanut butter sandwich when he was just over a year old.
Deadly Peanut Allergies: A Parent's Nightmare
For parents of children with severe anaphylactic reactions, it can be all but impossible to create a safe environment at school, home, birthday parties, amusement parks, or movie theatres. A life-threatening allergic reaction may be triggered by:
- Peanut butter residue on the hands of another child at school, who didn't wash her hands after eating breakfast
- Birthday cake that may itself be nut-free, but made on the same machines used to make peanut-containing pastries a few days before
- Cross-contamination of "safe" foods at a party where people are eating nuts without washing their hands before dipping into the chip bowl
- "Safe" foods that do not mention nuts on the label but may have been contaminated in a kitchen or factory
When Dina Clifford's son Ryan was diagnosed with a life-threatening peanut allergy in 2004, she says, she read everything she could about peanut allergies and was "overwhelmed by the uncommon places that nuts or nut oils might appear."
"My doctor called both my day care director and owner and felt neither one understood that this allergy was potentially fatal… I began to wonder how I would leave [Ryan] anywhere again. How could I educate his teachers on all the potential dangers that I had read about?"
The prototype for the "Beyond a Peanut" flashcards was born.
"Beyond a Peanut" Allergy Flashcards
The "Beyond a Peanut" flashcards were designed as an aid to teaching children, teachers, other parents and friends about the dangers involved with peanut allergies.
"Everything that I have ever heard about working where your passion lies is true," says Clifford, whose company Mind Flight LLC now produces the "Beyond a Peanut" cards and other educational materials she designed with her own children, now 6-1/2 and 5 years old, in mind.
The flashcards are sorted into four different sections by colour: green and red cards for teaching children about items that are usually safe and those that should be avoided, yellow cards to raise adult awareness about peanut safety and cross-contamination (including cards on "Bulk Foods," "Fund Raisers and Bake Sales," and "Airplanes"), and blue cards with general information ("Emergency Medical Identification," "Some Signs of an Allergic Reaction").
With simple language and bright, clear images, the cards are easy for children to understand and provide vital information, filling in the missing link for kids, teachers, daycares and childcare providers.
The "Beyond a Peanut" cards have the endorsement of the Food Allergy Initiative (FIA), a non-profit organization that supports food allergy research and education.
The flashcards are available for purchase at Beyond a Peanut.
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