Could This Prevent Food Allergies? Early Introduction Discussed with Catherine Jaxon of Mission MightyMe

In this episode, Dr. Alice Hoyt interviews Catherine Jackson, co-founder of Mission MightyMe, about the evolution of food allergy prevention, early allergen introduction, and Mission MightyMe's  innovative products designed to encourage early and regular consumption of allergens. They discuss recent research, pediatric feeding guidelines changes, and practical tips for parents managing food allergies.

Resources mentioned:
Mission MightyMe
Dr. Hoyt's free CME course on feeding babies to prevent food allergies
Navigating Food Allergies by Dr. Alice Hoyt — available now

Resources

📖 Navigating Food Allergies: A Parent’s Guide to Care, Coverage, and Confidence by Dr. Alice Hoyt - order from Amazon and more 

For Parents ➡️ Office Hours for Parents 

For Providers ➡️ Food Allergy Pediatric Hub

For Schools ➡️ Code Ana

For Potential Patients ➡️ Hoyt Institute of Food Allergy

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This podcast is the official podcast of the Hoyt Institute of Food Allergy. Information on, within, and associated with this site and Food Allergy and Your Kiddo is for educational purposes only and is not medical advice.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Background

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hello and welcome to Food Allergy and Your Kiddo. I'm your host, Dr. Alice Hoyt. Very excited to be joined by someone I now absolutely call a friend who we look back and saw the last time she was on our podcast, and it was 2022. It seems like it was just yesterday. Catherine Jackson. Catherine is the co-founder of Mission Mighty Me. As you may know, that company is absolutely focused on making early introduction easier and more accessible for families. And that comes a lot from their own personal experience. And Catherine's work is absolutely deeply personal. She's a mom of three. And like so many families, her journey started when her oldest daughter developed severe food allergies. And that experience, the realization that newer research might have changed that outcome, that set her and her family on a mission to help other families prevent food allergies before they start. And before this amazing woman founded Mission Mighty Me, she was an award-winning journalist and documentary producer at CNN, where she developed a very deep curiosity for research and storytelling skills that she now brings, that she's translating this complex science into something that parents can actually use and improve their lives and change the trajectory of their child's lives before hopefully allergy even sets in. Catherine, welcome back, my friend.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

Thank you so much, Dr. Hoyt. That was an amazing introduction. I appreciate it. And I just can't get over that it's been that long since we first really met on your podcast four years ago. And so much has happened since then.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

I know. Um I am forever grateful to my mother-in-law for many reasons. But one reason is because it's because of her that I found out about you when I did.

How We Connected Through A Newspaper

SPEAKER_00 2:08

If you haven't listened to the first podcast that Catherine and I did together, go back to that episode and listen to it. But I'll shortly recap how she and I met. My mother-in-law um saw a c saw in the Atlanta, the what's the name of the Atlanta Journal?

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Atlanta Journal and Constitution.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Yes, the old school newspaper. The newspaper in Atlanta, which is where my in-laws live, which is where Catherine and her family live. The newspaper did a really nice article on Catherine, on her husband, Mission Mighty Me. And my mother-in-law saw it and she cut it out in total like mom fashion, right? Cut it out and brought it to me for our family beach trip. And I read it. I was like, oh my gosh, this is amazing. I have to have this person on the podcast. And I think I just like cold emailed you or something.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

I think so. And I love that. And I, as an old school journalist, I still consider myself an old school journalist. I love that it was, you know, she found it in the newspaper, and that's what brought us together. And you've just been such a great friend to us and friend to the brand ever since. Well, thank you. You know, you're one of our first calls whenever we have a question or need some expertise uh and guidance. So thank you.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Well, I love working with you guys. Um, I am an advisor on occasion for you guys, so I will put that disclosure out there. Um, but one of the reasons that I like to work with y'all is because you're so dedicated to making a clean, honest product that has in it what it says it has in it, so that we can prevent food allergies. And also, as we'll talk some about in this episode, actually use it to help treat food allergies, which is super exciting for us. I'm sure it's very exciting for you guys too.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Yes. I mean, as a food allergy family and food allergy parents, um, and I know we'll get more into the details of that later. That was, you know, um, has been kind of an amazing development that we had not expected when we started this company. Um has been a really, a really amazing, you know, development. And we can get into all of that.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

Yeah. Yes. Well, let's

Early Introduction Guidelines Today

SPEAKER_00 4:34

get into that because when we first had you guys on the show, when you were first on the show in 2022, there have been changes and stronger recommendations about the importance of introducing allergens early and often to prevent the development of food allergy. And as we'll also talk about on this show, is that when you have a child who already has a food allergy, as most of our listeners do, it can be very overwhelming, scary, anxiety-producing to think about I have to introduce this allergen to my other child to help them not have the food allergy. But what if my child accidentally inject? It's just, it's it's a hard position to be in. But let's let's take a step back and talk about how have you seen things change from from your point of view of early introduction.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

Yeah, well, you know, just to kind of give like a quick recap of how we kind of got into this in the first place. For us, it was very much a pain point that we experienced as parents years ago, because as you know, the guidance used to be don't give babies peanuts, tree nuts, or other allergens in infancy. Um and we now know that unfortunately that guidance was wrong and was actually likely causing many more kids to develop allergies than otherwise would have. And we feel like our daughter is one of those kids. We think, you know, she actually did not have any risk factors. Um, and she we avoided nuts when she was a baby, and then she went on to develop an allergy, a severe allergy to most nuts. Um so having that experience, you know, we just assumed that we were gonna be get get the nuts out of the house, carry an EpiPen with us everywhere we go. We had one in every diaper bag from then on, um, and that avoidance was the only option. And for a long time, that's what families were told that avoidance was the only option. Um, so fast forward to 2015, we were having our third child, and that was the year that the leap study was published. The learning early about peanut allergy study. And the leap study showed that, you know, of course, actually including peanut protein in babies' diets early in the early in the first year of life and then regularly through age five could prevent the majority of peanut allergies.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

And that was specifically in kids who were at high risk of developing peanut allergies. So they were really trying to demonstrate that this works because they took those kiddos who either had an egg allergy or they had severe eczema, which the group had already, the research group had already identified those two things were risk factors for developing peanut allergy. So they took those high-risk kiddos and they put them in that study. And you're exactly right.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

And it was, and it was just so definitive. And so, you know, we're trying to do this with our youngest. Like, okay, we might actually be able to help him avoid a food allergy like his big sister has. Um we don't have to just avoid, avoid, avoid. Let's try to get nuts in his diet early. But of course, nuts and nut butters are a choking hazard for a baby. And the entire baby food aisle at the time was allergen-free. So we were just as parents frustrated because we were trying to, you know, follow the new research, um, which then ended up changing the guidelines globally. And yet there were no foods on the baby aisle that even contained nuts as an ingredient. So that's we ended up partnering with Dr. Lack, who led the leap study, you know. Um, and we launched Mission Mighty Me to change that. But, you know, since then and since our first conversation, so much has changed because it really did used to be from the time babies are born, you know, in infancy, you just avoid the allergens altogether. Um now the guidelines have completely changed to say actually you want to get peanuts, nuts, egg, and other allergens in the diet early because that immune system is malleable. And the earlier, you know, once they're ready for solids, of course, the earlier you can train the immune system to recognize that food is just food and it's safe and it's not something to be um attacked or reacted to, the earlier you can do that, the better. And so now, you know, globally the guidelines are so different. Um, and then of course, even for, and you can speak better to this, but even for food allergic children under the supervision of a doctor, of course, um there's been so much, so much many increase incredible developments with oral immunotherapy, um sensitizing children through exposure to tiny amounts. Um I just feel like in the, you know, in the years since our first podcast together, um, there's been a total sea change.

SPEAKER_00 9:54

Yeah. Yeah, I I completely agree. It it really is exciting. Um, and so that leads me somewhat into our next question that a lot of our listeners are already managing food allergies in their kiddos. And so talk to us more about how your work really applies to those families.

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Yes. I mean, I I think for families who have a child with food allergies, they get it more than anybody. I mean, as a as a mom of a daughter with food allergies, if there's anything you could do to prevent it, you would because it's such a it's such a burden for a kid to carry around with them and it also really impacts their quality of life. Yeah. Um, and so, you know, now that we have such definitive research showing that food allergies can be prevented, I think that it is actually empowering because you're not necessarily just helpless. You know, not just avoid it and hope your child doesn't develop a food allergy. You can be proactive about it. And this is, of course, for you know, if you have an older sub an older child with a food allergy, this is like for younger siblings who come along. There is something in your control that you can do to help reduce the risk that they they develop a food allergy, and that's getting the allergens in the diet early and regularly. Um, and I think for food allergy families, like they understand that on a level that um that most families don't. And um at the same time, it's a little complicated because you want to make sure you're keeping that older child safe and that you're doing it in a way that, you know, still is giving your younger ones the benefit of early introduction, but isn't um, you know, putting your older child at risk in any way for an accidental reaction. So it takes careful navigating.

SPEAKER_00 12:02

Right. No, it absolutely does. It absolutely does. And I want to go back to the leap study for a moment. And was there a moment like when you first heard about the leap study or the data coming out from that where you were just like, wait a second, what, what, what? Like, do you can you think back to that moment that before Mission Mighty Me, where you're like, wait, there's something we can do? You're absolutely right. Early introduction is the only modifiable risk factor that we have regarding food allergies. If your baby has eczema or your baby has an egg allergy, like that's we can modify an egg allergy, right? But they already have that condition, right? But early introduction is a modifiable risk factor, meaning if we're able to introduce allergens early, especially in these higher risk kids, then we are able to decrease the risk of having a food allergy. But this was incredibly novel back when you first heard about the leap study. So do you can you think back to that time?

SPEAKER_01 13:03

Yes, um, absolutely. I mean, I remember when I first read about the leap study, it it totally rocked my world because it was the opposite of what we had kind of all thought for years. It's just that you need to avoid these foods.

SPEAKER_00 13:19

Right. And let

How Bad Guidance Fueled Allergies

SPEAKER_00 13:20

me interrupt for one second, because I'll I'll recap sort of that history of food allergies. Food allergies were described in the early 1900s. It wasn't super common though, right? And then in the late 1990s, there was this uptick in peanut allergy that was recognized. So then, in response to that uptick, expert opinion became oh, well, let's have kids avoid these allergens until their immune system is ready for them. That was in 2000. That was absolutely the wrong approach, right? That was not evidence-based medicine, that was expert opinion. And it was so wrong that in 2008, the AAP kind of walked back those recommendations, but there wasn't really good evidence for what really to do. And at this point, we had so over-medicalized how we feed children that for a pediatrician to then say, Oh, well, you actually can have peanut butter when you're four months old as long as it's diluted, was just not, that was not gonna go, right? Like, and even today we still have challenges with adoption of these recommendations. But then from 2008 up until the leap study, there was like this, and and I'll tell you, the way things typically work in medicine is you practice how you're trained, you know, and so if you were trained to tell families to have them avoid these things until you actually see like the hardcore data that changing your practice is going to result in a good outcome for your patients, you're not gonna change your practice. So that was you're you're exactly right. Like we started, we saw that uptick, we made bad recommendations, and we've been trying to battle them ever since.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Yeah, that's right. Um, and that was like a perfect timeline recap because it was such a roller coaster of, you know, advice. And then, you know, you can kind of look at the statistics and see once that advice became mainstream of avoidance, what happened to the rate of food allergies, and it just skyrocketed. But because there was not um, you know, a randomized controlled trial like the leap study, there wasn't like hard data, doctors were hesitant to really overturn those recommendations and say, actually, you need to be proactive about this and get these foods in the diet. Um, and I remember reading about the leap study, and um the head of the um National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Disease at the time said, um said, This study is so groundbreaking that it's gonna completely transform how we approach food allergy prevention and it has the potential to save thousands and thousands of kids from peanut allergies. I mean, that right there just rocked my world. Like there's nothing that we can do that can help prevent this for our youngest child. Yeah. Um, and of course, you know, my husband JJ and I we talked about this for a long time. I mean, it took a while for the guidelines to change. I think it was 2017 before the guidelines, you know, from the NIH um formally changed to recommend early and regular exposure to peanuts.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

But all depending on your risk stratification, they were pretty complicated. They still are complicated. And in the world of allergy, what a lot of people don't realize is that to become an a board certified allergist, you can either be a pediatrician or an internist, meaning an adult doctor. And then both pediatricians and internists, they do the same fellowship. But inevitably, like a lot of you know, uh, internists end up practicing more adult allergy. And so we really have a relatively small number of uh experts, board certified allergists, who are super plugged into this space to really help take the data and translate it out into real life clinical experience. It's tough.

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Yeah. And and having those guidelines change even that quickly, even in two years, was shocking. I mean, because the having medical guidelines like that change is such a process, as you know. But, you know, once once the NIH and then, you know, American Academy of Pediatrics, and really globally, the guidelines were changing because of the leaf study um led by Dr. Lack, our co-founder, our now co-founder, he wasn't at the time. But because all those guidelines were changing, and I was reading about this, and you know, pediatricians were supposed to be telling parents, introduce peanut foods at six months, you know, as early as four to six months. And and yet there was still at the time not one product on the baby aisle that had peanut as an ingredient. Um, and you know, we're trying to get these nuts into our son's diet. And peanuts are hard enough, but doable. There are gazillion tree nuts, you know. Try getting walnuts, cashews, pistachias, um, try getting all of the tree nuts into a baby's diet when they don't have teeth and it's choking hazard. And it was just incredibly frustrating. Um, and so we were, you know, we were buying these jars of mixed nut butters that had a collection of mixed nuts in them. And they were, you know, messy and sticky and super expensive. And I hated that because we also had an older child with a food allergy. So I didn't like that we use nut butter all over our kitchen. Um, and it was a mess. Yeah. And at the same time, we were also buying baby puffs just because our kids, you know, you know, love them. But I was like, these things have no nutritional value. They were 99% rice. They would say they were like broccoli and kale organic puffs or whatever, but you'd look at the ingredient label and it would be like less than two percent of broccoli and kale. And I was like, ah, this drives me.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

And where were they produced too? Right. So then what were their production regulations and quality control? As you and I have had so many discussions off offline about quality control. Yeah. Um, I am not a fan of the baby food aisle at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 19:53

Well, I I was so I, you know, I really was like, these this product is not doing anything for him. Um, but he loves it. And then to answer your earlier question of like, was there a moment when you, you know, kind of had like a light bulb moment? Um,

The Lightbulb Idea Behind MightyMe

SPEAKER_01 20:10

it was after the guidelines had changed. JJ and I were sitting in the kitchen one night, you know, talking about how crazy it was that there was still no product on the baby aisle that made it possible to follow these guidelines that all pediatricians were supposed to be recommending to their patients. Um, and I was sitting there with a canister of those useless rice puffs and the jar of um, you know, mixed nut butter that we were buying. And um, and I said, why can someone not just put these two products together? And then you would have a baby puff that actually did something for them. It would be a great, easy way to follow the guidelines, right? But it would also just be healthier, um, healthier snack. And um, I was like, I think it would be delicious to have a nut butter puff. Um and so ultimately that's that's what we did. You know, we we kept waiting for the big brands to do it, and it wasn't happening. And um JJ and I ended up reaching out to Dr. Lack, who led the leap study, and asked him if he would um really just advise us on formulating a product to make sure it matched his research. And he was also at that point, you know, kind of frustrated. The research had been out there, the guidelines had changed, but there were still so few options that made it easy for parents to follow the guidelines. And so he said, I'd actually just like to become a co founder with you. Um, and so he co founded the company with us. That's amazing. We launched our first nut butter puffs in 2020.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

That's amazing. And here we are. 2026 and you're in Target, you're in Walmart. Congratulations. Um what that that's still like six years, but that that journey of recognizing there's something that we can do. Um but what what about that moment too when you're like, wait, there's something that we could have done and we didn't do it? Like that's tough.

SPEAKER_01 22:31

Yeah. For sure. You know, I I think um I think knowing that we might have been able to change the trajectory for our older daughter if we had known then what we know now. Um can feel can certainly feel frustrating. But I also think, you know, there's we're all as parents just doing the best we can with the information that we have, and as doctors, doing the best we can with the information that we have. And then when that changes, um we change with it. So, you know, I always think about when I think about this situation specifically, I always think about that Maya Angelo quote that says, do the best you can um till you know better, and then when you know better, do better. And so that's kind of how I've tried to look at it is like, okay, we can't change the past. I wish I had known, but I'm not gonna be consumed with, you know, guilt about it. I'm just gonna do what I can to help other families avoid the same situation.

SPEAKER_00 23:46

And you absolutely are.

SPEAKER_01 23:49

Sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

I you absolutely are. I mean, you have dedicated your professional life to creating a product that is safe for babies. And I know for a fact that y'all eat them all the time. And so, like, that's just amazing to me that you saw a problem, you saw a potential solution that was gonna help not just your family, but uh millions of other families. Talk to us for a minute about like about that journey. And like for you professionally, you were a reporter. You were not you were you were not in the food production industry. So how how has that transition been?

SPEAKER_01 24:38

Well, it's been um a very steep learning curve. We I mean, there was, you know, like you said, we had no experience in food production. And, you know, I was a journalist, JJ was in finance. We never said, you know, we want to start a food company. It was really the necessity, like the need that we saw for this product that launched us on this path. And we knew when we started, because we didn't have experience in the food industry, we knew that we were gonna have to bring on experts to make sure, you know, we were doing everything exactly right. And so we started with Dr. Lack, you know, the expert to make sure that's a good place to start. Right.

Dosing Allergens Without Making It Medical

SPEAKER_01 25:28

Um, yeah, I mean, we were just so grateful that he was so excited to co-found the company with us. And so um, you know, we we wanted his expertise to really make sure we were formulating our products in a way that matched his research and his um his studies. So I'll just quickly tell you like the um the nut protein in all of our products is is very intentional to match his research. Um, so you know, we have several different flavors of peanut butter puffs. They all have about seven grams of peanut protein per pouch, which matches um the amount that the babies in the LEAP study consumed and also the amount that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends weekly for high-risk baby.

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Um and to put that in peanut butter terms, that's like one adult serving of peanut butter is two tablespoons of peanut butter, which is about seven grams of peanut protein.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

Right. Yeah. But it just kind of makes it easy, right? Like you don't have to think about it, you don't have to dose it, you can just kind of if you have a pouch a week, you've you've met it. And that's was very important to us was to make it not feel medical and be enjoyable.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

And then how many times have I texted you a picture of my kids with their bags of pop? I know, I love it, and that's the trail mix, by the way, is a huge hit.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

The what?

SPEAKER_00 27:00

The trail mix.

SPEAKER_01 27:01

The trail mix in our house too. Everyone who can eat it, four of the five of us, crush the trail mix. It is delicious. Um, and we, you know, we created the trail mix. So, because we you gotta keep nuts in the diet. It's important the babies in the leap study, you know, regularly ate peanuts for five the first five years of life. And so we just knew we needed some more like fun, enjoyable ways to get um to keep nuts in the diet. And that's why we came up with the nutty trail mix. But um, the other, you know, original product that we launched with Dr. Lack was this mixed nut butter puff, which this is the product I was really dreaming about when James was six months old because it was so hard to get all the tree nuts in his diet. And so, you know, this has a collection of five different nuts. And again, nut proteins are it's equal parts protein from each nut, which not to bore anyone with food science formulations, but that is not an easy feat to accomplish with formulation. And so that's why it was so important for us to like start with Dr. Lack, get him on board, make sure we were creating products that matched his research, and then bring on other experts. And that is really how we've kind of done it from the beginning. You know, you included, as soon as we connected, I wanted you involved. Um, and so we've just really sought out whether it's, you know, food scientists, product formulation, production partners, quality control, um, you know, quality control plans and standards. We have just found the experts who can help us do everything, you know, the best best we possibly can. And we have brought them in. And of course, we've learned a ton. And, you know, now we're um, I mean, I can no longer say we don't have we're new to the food industry or we don't have experience in the food industry. But um, but it was no, you're in Walmart.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

I mean, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 29:18

Yeah. But and a lot of that was just because of, you know, all of the amazing people we've been able to partner with um along the way who've who've lent their expertise to us.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

And I love the the high quality ingredients that y'all use because as I've mentioned today, as I've mentioned on prior episodes, the baby food aisle is just not an aisle anybody should spend a lot of time on. Because really, how we should feed babies, and I have a whole course on this that I'll put in the show notes, and it's actually accredited for five hours of continuing medical education, and it's totally free. So if you're a pediatrician listening to this, please click, click the link in the show notes, and you can get five hours of CME and learn really how to how to feed babies, how to feed babies to prevent food allergies. And it's a lot of let's de-un medicalize how we're feeding babies. And the baby food aisle seems to preach like, oh, you have to introduce this and then introduce this, and it has to be in this pouch, and you have to do these puffs and like all these things, and those the puffs, not your puffs. I like your puffs. But the other puffs, you're

Clean Ingredients

SPEAKER_00 30:34

exactly right. They have like nothing in them. And I get concerned, as I mentioned, about where things are being produced, because in the US, we do have strict regulations about how foods must be produced, how they must be processed. And what I've been impressed by you guys from the beginning, but even more so as I've been sort of a peripheral part of y'all's journey, is how you're not you're not satisfied. You were not satisfied with the first iteration, even though it was fantastic. But then, was it last year y'all added sorghum? The sorghum formulation, I actually think they taste better. I thought they were great before, but I think they actually taste better now. They're still pretty like melty. Like, I don't think that has changed. What I mean by that is that if you have a baby that doesn't have teeth, then like how are they going to chew a puff, right? But what's so nice about these puffs is that they start to, they start to melt, dissolve pretty quickly when they go into the mouth, which immunologically I like, because then the mouth, the oral mucosa, the back door to the immune system, is getting access to those allergens. And y'all are very intentional about trying to have an equal and a good evidence-based amount of each of those allergens in the puffs. But talk a little bit about the, you know, there's a lot with Maha right now about clean foods. Talk a little bit about y'all sourcing and organic and all these things that we as parents, we want to feed our kids good, high quality food. And I'll tell you that there's there's not a lot of foods I would feed my kids when they were young like that, but your puffs were one of them. And it's because I knew that y'all were definitely doing your due diligence to have what is in that puff bag be highest quality ingredient for my child.

SPEAKER_01 32:30

Well, um, it's just makes me smile to hear that because um, you know, as a mom, what one of the reasons we started this company, like I said, there were very few products that made this possible. Um, certainly not for tree nuts, but there were peanut puffs out there, and I didn't like the ingredients and I didn't feel great feeding them to my baby. I didn't want him to have something corn-based. I didn't want him to have something high salt, I didn't want him to have something with palm oil in it. Everything else he was eating was, you know, non-GMO, organic, clean, even though the puffs he was eating had no nutritional value, they were organic or they were non-GMO. Um, and so I really wanted an option that checked all of those boxes. And so that was important to us from the beginning. Um, and then to your point about um using sorghum as the base, you know, we felt like if we could make sorghum work from a dissolvability standpoint, we wanted to change the formulation because sorghum is just a much more nutritious grain. So all of the puffs are more than 50% nuts sorghum. Um, and sorghum is sort of like what gives it the puffy dissolvability of a puff. Um, but sorghum is an ancient grain, it's naturally gluten-free, it has higher protein than corn or rice. And so we really wanted to to make it work. And when we finally, after multiple, multiple um, you know, rounds and trials, got it dialed in to where it dissolved just as quickly. And I agree with you, I think tastes even better. Um, we wanted to make the switch. And so, you know, now like I'm just so proud of I'm so proud of our ingredient label. I mean, you look at our ingredient label and it's it's more than 50% nuts, you know, you've got hazelnuts, peanuts, cashew, almond, walnut. Um, and then you've got um sorghum. And um, and you know, it's um it's just it's just a better snack, which is also what we were hoping to do because you know, there are lots of people out there who are not going to be focused on food allergy prevention, and that's fine. And that, you know, the research has shown that children who are not high risk, this applies to everyone, right? Whether you're high risk or not, it's important to get um these foods to get peanuts and tree nuts in the diet for all kids to really bring down the rate of food allergies, and that is ultimately our mission. And so we knew that for this to be truly effective, it had to become just a better snack, right? So whether you're focused on food allergy prevention or you just wanted a better tasting or a healthier puff for your kiddo, it would regularly be in the snacking rotation. Um and so the way we and the way we developed it, and the reason we started with a puff in the first place um is because we just knew it had to be something that kids loved that also had really clean ingredients and could be a kind of an upgrade.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

And so thinking about where y'all started, where y'all are now, um, and to your point that early introduction to prevent food allergies, it impacts more than kids who are at high risk. I can't tell you how many times I have patients come in for consultation. So the parents are like, we don't have anybody in our family who has a food allergy. Like, we we don't we don't know anything about this, you know. Um, the work you're doing can literally impact an entire generation. Um and so for you, what does success look like 10 years from now?

SPEAKER_01 36:46

You know, Dr. Lack will say that if we can if early introduction, early and regular um exposure to allergens, it's not just early. It's not just one and done. That's a very important point, is that like getting these foods in early, but then keeping them in the diet. Um, but with peanut foods, for example, if that becomes widespread, we could avoid um, you know, a hundred thousand peanut allergies a year more globally for kids. So you're looking at in a decade a million kids who would not have to live with the burden of food allergies and then multiply that out, you know, 50 years.

A 10 Year Plan To Cut Allergies

SPEAKER_01 37:36

I think there is the real potential that we could end the food allergy epidemic. Now, this is not a hundred percent, this is not saying that no one's gonna develop food allergies. I mean, the the research isn't a hundred percent, but it is so definitive. You know, if we can prevent more than 80% of food allergies, yeah, that completely turns back the clock to a time where food allergies were not running everyone's lives because right now they kind of are. I mean, they've impacted everything, right? Schools, airplanes, ballparks. Um, every classroom has an average of two children in it with a food allergy. It's just they have become so prevalent. And to be able to prevent food allergies on that magnitude would have a massive public health impact. So ultimately, you know, that is the goal. And um and I think we want to play a small part in making that happen. And I think I think making that happen hinges on um having foods out there that are easy, that are simple, that are safe, that make it possible for parents to follow these guidelines in the first place.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

Absolutely. And and as we wrap up, what what words of wisdom, what advice, what you know, what do you what would you like to leave our listeners with? That mom who is just thinking, how am I gonna do this because my older kiddo has a food allergy and I don't want my younger kiddo? Or or the mom who's like, man, we didn't do early introduction, or the mom who's like, we did do early introduction, we're still here. You know, as the mom of a kiddo with food allergies, what sort of words of advice do you have for our listeners?

SPEAKER_01 39:39

I think it's so important that we just ditch all of the mom or dad guilt, right? You know, like I said earlier, I just we are all doing the best we can with the information we have. But the good news is that we now have some really encouraging information, which I think should be empowering, right? There is something in your control that you can do. It may not be a hundred percent, but if it's more than 80%, isn't it worth a shot? And if you have reservations about it or you're nervous, that is completely understandable. We were terrified because of our past experience. And I think for parents who have an older kid with food allergies who've experienced it before, it

No Guilt And Don’t Miss The Window

SPEAKER_01 40:29

can be very scary. And I would say to those parents, it's even it's probably even more important. And um talk to your pediatrician. And and if you are uncomfortable doing it in your in your home, um, you know, doing early introduction in your home, do it at your doctor's visit. Just say, hey, can I do an in-office introduction? I'm really nervous, but I don't want to sit and worry about it and miss the window, right? Because the window is small and the window closes really around 12 months. Um, so so you wanna make sure you're not missing the window. And if you need some support in order to do that, most pediatricians um will say, Okay. Or they'll say, you know, I'll refer you to an allergist. But the main thing is you don't want to waste time. You don't want a bottleneck to keep you from missing the window. So I think, you know, if if the statistics are showing us that it's more than 80% chance, that's that's a pretty compelling reason to go ahead and try it and try it safely. Talk to your doctor, make sure, you know, your doctor is involved. And um, and if you are at all uncomfortable, ask if you can do it in your doctor's office. But just do it. The earlier the better. Once they're ready for solids, and then once you have introduced, it's so important to keep it in the diet regularly. Keep it in the diet, not one and done.

SPEAKER_00 42:10

No, it's not one and done, and it's not a test to make sure they're not allergic, it is an intervention to prevent the development.

SPEAKER_01 42:20

Like going to the gym for your immune system, right? If you go to the gym once, it is not gonna do anything. You might learn that you can run on a treadmill, but it's not gonna change anything. So if you go to the gym multiple times and run on that treadmill, you're actually training your body. And that is where, you know, the consistency piece really comes in. And you're ultimately training your immune system while it's still malleable enough to learn.

SPEAKER_00 42:50

Right. Right. And on that note, um, we've been loving the puffs here because, like myself and some of my colleagues across the country will use those for desensitization. So let's say your kiddo does develop the allergy and you get plugged in with an allergist, and you're one or two or three. Um, we can do oral immunotherapy older too, but definitely in those younger ages where that window has just kind of closed, we like to reopen that window and we like to teach that immune system to tolerate it. And I'll say it's so nice to have a way to get down to a pretty low amount of peanut butter without diluting peanut butter, which can be like just like a little bit annoying. Um, but using the puffs, we've started incorporating the puffs into our OIT protocols. And the

Oral Immunotherapy With Doctor Supervision

SPEAKER_00 43:41

kids love it and the parents love it. And one parent was telling me the other day, she loved it so much because it's very, very easy. And I think that comes back to sort of your part of your whole motivation. Your motivation was science and prevention, but it has to be done in a way that That is feasible, that's practical for real families. And you have achieved that, ma'am. And thank you.

SPEAKER_01 44:07

Well, thank you. I mean, that was we talked about it earlier, but that was one of the um developments since we talked last that really was not um we didn't know that that was a possibility. And it's certainly not why we developed Mission Mighty Me. You know, we really developed the product for prevention, for getting it in early before those food allergies develop. But um studies since then have shown that the earlier you can start, if you if a kiddo does have already have a developed allergy, the earlier you can start oral immunotherapy with tiny amounts under the care of a doctor. Very important. Not a good idea.

SPEAKER_00 44:50

Yes, board supervised allergy.

SPEAKER_01 44:53

Um, but under the care of an allergist, desensitization can be very effective, especially if it started young. The sooner the better after an allergy is identified. And so, yes, we have a lot of allergists who do use the product for that purpose. Um, we are always very careful to say to customers and parents that that is not something that, you know, you you undertake on your own. You definitely need to be working with an allergist, definitely need to be working with a doctor and doing that under supervision. But some of the stories that we've heard coming out of those practices of, you know, kids who had a diagnosed peanut allergy and are now able to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich whenever they want it is just incredible. And again, is not something that we really ever even thought about when we were first developing this product. But as a food allergy mom, to know it's helping kids who also have food allergies is really incredible.

SPEAKER_00 46:05

Catherine Jackson, well done. Thank you so much for coming back on the show. Come back soon.

SPEAKER_01 46:10

Okay, wait. I have to also give a shout out to you, Dr. Hoyt, because um you have a book coming out. Uh by the time this airs, this book will be out. People can purchase it. And I have had the um joy of getting to read the whole book and writing a little um endorsement on the back. And as I was saying earlier, I really wish I had this when my daughter was first diagnosed. It would have made the whole process so much easier. Um, navigating food allergies, a parent's guide to care, coverage, and confidence. And I love that because confidence and empowering parents with information really is what is important to letting families,

Book Shoutout And Final Reminders

SPEAKER_01 47:04

parents, and kids live life to the fullest because you can live life to the fullest even with food allergy. You just need the information to do that confidently. And you so beautifully lay that out in such a clear, simple way in this book. So, congratulations. This is awesome. And I just think something that like all caregivers need in their arsenal.

SPEAKER_00 47:31

Thank you. You're so sweet. Thank you for that. You're awesome. Come back soon. That's the episode. Thanks so much for tuning in. Remember, I'm an allergist, but I'm not your allergist. So talk with your allergist about what you learned today. And like and subscribe and share this with your friends. God bless you and God bless your family.