Food allergies in preschool children

1 Food allergies in children are common (affecting up to 8% of children) and their prevalence has been increasing in the last two to three decades. The basic measure for the long-term management of food allergy is an elimination diet, i.e. the exclusion of the relevant allergen from the diet. An elimination diet can disrupt and endanger healthy growth and development of a child. Therefore, it is important that elimination diets with a serious impact on the patient's diet are based on a medically confirmed diagnosis of food allergy. Preschool children eat to a significant extent outside their homes - 60 % of their diet is provided by the nursery school. The aim of the work is to provide parents of children with suspected or actual food allergy practical recommendations regarding their nutrition in the form of educational material, using the latest theoretical knowledge and with emphasis on food elimination only on the basis of proven food allergy and help to parents regarding nutrition of allergic children in nursery school. The main output of the work consists of educational material in Annex 2 of the thesis. The educational material will help to increase parents' awareness of food allergy and the need to confirm it by an allergist, especially in cases of risk of serious reactions and serious effects on the..