By Dr. Robert A. Wood MD, with Joe Kraynak
Food allergies are more widespread than ever before. In the past five years, the number of children allergic to peanuts has doubled, and the estimated number of Americans with food allergies has increased from 6 million to approximately 11 million. If you are a food allergy sufferer or a parent of an allergic child, For Dummies® is here to help with the newly published, first edition of Food Allergies For Dummies (Wiley Publishing).
Written by Dr. Robert A. Wood, renowned food allergist and Professor of Pediatrics and Chief of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, this no-nonsense guide offers reassuring counsel and advice on everything allergy related — including how to identify and avoid foods that cause allergic reactions, how to proceed in case of an allergic reaction, and how to determine if foods are right for readers’ dietary restrictions. The book also offers first-hand advice from Dr. Wood who has lived with his own peanut allergy his entire life.
Food Allergies For Dummies covers food allergies from cause to cure. You’ll learn how to:
- Identify the common symptoms of a reaction, prepare for a severe reaction, and respond when a reaction occurs
- Team up with your doctor to identify problem foods and eliminate them from your diet — without making your diet overly restrictive
- Realistically assess the risk of being in the same room with the problem food
- Decipher complex food labels to determine if any of the ingredients are problem foods
- Find medications that are most effective for relieving symptoms, as well as alternative tests and therapies that have not been proven to be of any use
- Explore medical research to gain hope for future cures
- Live well with food allergies at home, on the road, at work, at school, and wherever you choose to travel abroad
And that’s not all. Food Allergies For Dummies also includes real-life stories from food allergy sufferers revealing important lessons that everyone who has a food allergy should know. There is also special coverage of peanut allergy, including self-defense tips for those who deal with this most dangerous of food allergies on a daily basis, and a special section of 20 allergen-free recipes for breakfast, lunch, dinner, desserts and snacks.
Like all For Dummies® books, Food Allergies For Dummies concludes with a “Part of Tens” including “Teaching Your Child Ten Key Food Allergy Lessons,” “Packing Ten Key Food Allergy Tips for Camp, College, and Other Outings,” “Ten Common Dietary Substitutions,” “Ten Do’s and Don’ts for Responding to a Severe Reaction,” and more. The handy, tear-out “Cheat Sheet” provides a checklist of food allergy symptoms, a food label crib sheet, and a food allergy reaction response plan to let others know exactly what to do when you experience a severe reaction and can’t help yourself.
Robert A. Wood, MD, is Professor of Pediatrics and Chief of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD. After receiving his medical degree from the University of Rochester School of Medicine, he completed his residency in pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University, where he also completed an allergy and immunology fellowship. Dr. Wood, who has a lifelong, severe peanut allergy, is an internationally recognized expert in food allergy and childhood asthma and has published more than 100 manuscripts in scientific journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, Pediatrics, and the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, as well as numerous book chapters. He is Deputy Editor of Pediatric Allergy and Immunology, was Associate Editor of the Annals of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology, and has served on the editorial board of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. He is also on the Board of Directors of the American Board of Allergy and Immunology.
