Food Allergies - Beyond Avoidance: A Conversation with FAST OIT Co-Founder Dr. Doug Jones

In this episode, Dr. Alice Hoyt sits down with Dr. Doug Jones — board-certified allergist, co-founder and president of FAST OIT (Food Allergy Support Team), and host of The Immune Edit podcast — fresh off the FAST OIT Conference in Dallas.

Dr. Jones shares the patient encounter that changed the trajectory of his career: a family facing five simultaneous food allergies, a room full of tears, and a doctor who left the appointment and put his head on his desk in frustration. That moment sent him on a path to find something better, and eventually to Dr. Richard Wasserman, OIT, and building one of the most influential food allergy treatment communities in the world.

Together, Dr. Hoyt and Dr. Jones cover a lot of ground — including the complicated history of why OIT took so long to reach patients, what happens when business models and patient outcomes don't align, and why the next frontier is getting this treatment into mainstream allergy training.

In this episode:
~Why telling families "just avoid it and carry your EpiPen" never felt like enough
~The family that changed Dr. Jones's career — and what he did after they left his office
~How connecting with Dr. Wasserman in 2012 set everything in motion
~The divide between private practice and academia on OIT, and why it's finally shifting
~Why Palforzia mattered even for doctors who weren't using it
~What FAST OIT's email list of 700+ allergists is doing to break down silos
~The importance of patient goals — and why "bite proof" means something different to everyone
~Why teens and college students with food allergies are a population we need to reach
~What it means to ethically market your practice as an allergist
~Dr. Jones's biggest aha moment from this year's conference
~FAST London 2027 — and why the global expansion matters

Connect with Dr. Doug Jones:
Instagram: @DrDougJones
Website: doctordougjones.com, myimmunenetwork.com, fastoit.org
Podcast: The Immune Edit

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

🔎 Find an Allergist
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OIT Allergist Finder

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 FAST OIT Highlights

SPEAKER_03 0:05

Hello and welcome to Food Allergy and Your Kiddo. I'm your host, Dr. Alice Hoyt. Very excited to be back from the FAST OIT Conference, Food Allergy Support Team. That conference is in Dallas every year, led by some amazing people. And on the show today is one of those amazing people, Dr. Doug Jones. Thanks for being here, Doug.

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Thanks, Alice. This is awesome to be on with you. And it was great to see you in person in Dallas.

SPEAKER_03 0:33

Yes, it was that was a great conference.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Yeah, I I agree. I think it does keep getting better, but it's because the members, you know, those that attend come and then and they provide such value and then they give us feedback. And I read all of it. And so we just continue to evolve that based on, you know, those participating in the feedback. And that's what helps us get better.

SPEAKER_03 1:12

Yeah, it's very evident that y'all read the surveys and that those are um very important to the leadership team. And what I also love is that Dr. Wasserman does a big survey of all of us regarding the how we're practicing and what we're offering regarding OIT and the heterogeneity, which we will get into. But before we dive way into that, I want to tell our audience a little bit more about you because you're amazing. Um, Dr. Jones is a board-certified allergist and internist. He went to med school at Penn State and then he trained at Crichton. And he leads the Global Allergy Immune Network. He also leads the podcast, The Immune Edit, which launched earlier this year. Doug is also the president and co-founder of FAST OIT, Food Allergy Support Team. And then also in his spare time, he launched an amazing OIT practice in Australia.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Why not?

SPEAKER_03 2:12

And you're not in Australia.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

I'm not.

SPEAKER_03 2:16

So, so all of that is so amazing. And I really like to ask all of our guests, um, whether they're allergists, parents of kiddos with food allergy, but ultimately, like, what is what is your story? How did you end up here on this podcast, leading your product, leading your practice? Ultimately, how did you end up focusing your professional life on serving families of kids with food allergies?

The Family Visit That Changed Him

SPEAKER_00 2:41

It started with just listening to families, really, because we years ago, and I hate saying that because I have to admit my age sometimes, but but years ago, we didn't have great training in food allergy treatment or or even diagnostics. I mean, back in the earlier 2000s, uh, even when I finished my training and started practice, I never ever felt comfortable just telling families you have to avoid your food, carry your epinephrine, and hope for uh you know a good outcome. I forever within me, just within the core of me and my DNA, I felt so inadequate giving those recommendations. But that's all we had, and and that's all we could do. Yes, and and I felt that, and um and you know, so you I I have these families, and I had one family in particular that that really just changed me, and it I had already seen their son, he had peanut and tree nut allergies, and then the mom brought in their 11-month-old daughter who just had some milk spill on her, and she went hives head to toe, and and the mom was really distraught uh about they're already having to because you know it's not with just one child when you it's the whole family, and and the mom had this okay, we already have peanuts and tree nuts. Now you're gonna tell me it's milk, and is there anything else? And and her whole thing was I wanted my kid to have a birthday cake at one at her first year birthday. And so, long story short, after we tested and and kind of worked through some things, we found out it was milk, eggs, wheat, peanut, and tree nuts. And and so that's now what the family had to avoid. And, you know, mom's in tears, dad's kind of you know, that feeling of despair. And they look at me that day and they're like, what do we even feed her? And I was like, I don't know. Like, I was so I was sick to my stomach too, and I was like, I don't know. Because, you know, as allergists, we can give an answer to somebody and say, hey, you're allergic to X, Y, and Z, carrier epinephrine, uh, hope nothing bad happens. They're out the door and we're on to the next patient, but we just changed every single second of their life. Yeah, it's a different conversation on their end.

SPEAKER_03 5:17

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 5:18

And I knew that. And actually, after that particular visit, I didn't just go into the next patient. I went into my office and I put my head down in frustration on my desk, and I just thought, what am I doing? I did not serve them right now, and and I just felt so inadequate. And um, it was kind of at the same time that um, you know, I'd heard uh some of these pro-con debates on food allergy therapy early on, whether we should do it, whether it should be in the research arena, all the things you're talking about, whether we should offer oral immunotherapy. Correct. And

Finding OIT And A Better Option

SPEAKER_00 6:01

so at that point, I I thought I've never met Richard Wasserman, but I'm I'm gonna try and find out how I can connect with him because I heard him in the pro-con debate in a in a national meeting on OIT, and I was really impressed with how he was, who he was, how he handled himself, how he handled the questions, his intention behind everything was very much in alignment with me. And so I I reached out and he said, Come learn. And and I was shocked he was so open, and and I said, Okay. So I flew to Dallas and and learned, and and I just thought, this is it. You know, that felt more in alignment with who I was as a person and what I wanted to do, because now it's like there's something that we can offer parents, and then that that was the whole start of it, but the beginning was just feeling really inadequate. Feeling like when was that?

SPEAKER_03 7:02

When was that?

SPEAKER_00 7:04

That was like 2011, 2010. Yeah, yeah, 2011. I visited Dr. Wasserman in 2012, but you know, we that's when I and that's when I started. Um but uh yeah, it was just those feelings, and then thinking we've got to do a better job serving. There's gotta be because I'm not serving these patients right now.

SPEAKER_03 7:30

And I'm sorry I cut you off as you were describing how you felt in that moment. You, as this expert in allergy, there are not very many allergists in the country, especially not compared to the number of patients who have allergies. And as some of our listeners know, the way to become an allergist is you go to med school, then you do a residency in either internal medicine or pediatrics. So then you can straight up practice internal medicine or pediatrics. I did medPES, which is the combination of the two. But then there's only one pipeline for allergy, for board-certified allergists. So you have the pediatricians applying, you have the internists applying, you have the medPEEDS people applying, all for this pretty small pipeline. And you pass your internal medicine or pediatrics boards, you pass your allergy and immunology boards. Most allergists aren't about maybe 30 years old by the time they start practicing, maybe a little older than that, depending on how long their training programs are. And that is a long training to become very specialized in something. And in that moment, 15, 18-ish years ago, only 15 to 18-ish years ago, so many of our colleagues were feeling the exact same way as you of there's gotta be something I can do. I mean, patients would walk in with a pollen allergy and we can desensitize them. Patients can walk in with a honeybee allergy, which can absolutely be life-threatening, and we can desensitize them. But with a peanut allergy, and so many allergists, and even today, so many allergists are just like, there's gotta be something that I can do. And so for you to to as a professional feel that and feel that so deep, uh it's it really speaks, I would say, to who you are, but also to what you've built in the time since then.

SPEAKER_00 9:39

It's definitely evolved. Um, I had no idea, you know, just starting at where it was gonna go or what was going to happen, and and uh I knew it was gonna grow. That that was the one thing I knew because I, you know, after feeling desperation after desperation, family after family, seeing the scope that was out there, I said, once we started offering something, this is going to grow. And it and once it gets out, it's gonna grow fast. I knew that because of the the sheer numbers of families in desperation, but how it was all going to evolve, I you know, never foresaw that. I just we just wanted to offer patients a treatment. And I always say, not just hope, but hope and a plan. That's really what they need, is that hope plus this plan.

SPEAKER_03 10:27

So I I'm really glad. I'm really glad you brought up that part of your journey and the time period. And why I asked that is because when I was writing my book, Navigating Food Allergies, I really took sort of a deep dive on how we ended up in this situation regarding oral immunotherapy and had always kind of wondered why was there such a divide between the private practice world and academia regarding oral immunotherapy. And I came upon those articles that then were also presented this weekend where private practice doctors who had seen oral immunotherapy work were offering it to patients, shared decision making, informed consent,

Why OIT Split Medicine For Years

SPEAKER_03 11:17

you know, bilateral shared communication. Um good people, good doctors trying to offer offer hope, right? But offer treatment for something. And to see firsthand articles that were written, one in particular that was written that was really questioning the ethics of our colleagues who were trying to provide a a safe and effective treatment for patients and using real food, supermarket food, whatever food we want to call it, right? Like food to help kids grow tolerance or become less allergic, whatever terminology one uses, which we can talk about later too, about the importance of terms, right? But really be able to tolerate these foods, especially staple foods, foods like milk and that can be so hard to avoid. And and back then, too, it wasn't as easy to avoid peanut and tree nuts as it is today. Um and so I came up, so I finished med school in 2010, med Pete's residency in 2014 at Tulane, and then I went to UVA for fellowship. I did a three-year fellowship, went on to Van D onto faculty, and then went up to Cleveland Clinic. And so I I have that very academic, and I thought I would be an act, like really an employed physician, academic, employed physician. I thought that that was going to be my route. Um and so I I had never I had never really heard of these amazing private practice allergists, the Wassermans, the Joneses that were doing this treatment. And what was my experience was that I came back from an academy meeting and a quadie eye meeting, and I told Dr. David Lang, who was my boss at Cleveland Clinic, I said, I can't keep telling these patients that there's nothing that I can do. This is what I can do, and this is how I can do it in a feasible way using peanut butter, taking these evidence-based protocols out of the literature and using the same amount of peanut protein that is, you know, peanut butter versus peanut powder, whatever, it's just the amount of peanut protein. And I was very blessed that Dr. Lang was so supportive of me taking that path. But when we talk about, and you talked about training of allergists when you were in fellowship and even training of allergists today who are not getting the training to be able to take care of their patients, and then how many of them are now reaching out to us so that we can train more? It's just an absolutely fascinating, interesting, disturbing, upsetting um history, because I do look back at these kids and I think there could have been more that we could have done for some of these children. And so now we are trying to fix it. And I remember Caroline Caperton in her talk this weekend, you know, she gave a little bit of the background of the development of food allergy, and she's like, and now here we are, we're trying to to to fix it all. You know, we've already got the early introduction to prevent the development of food allergies. And now let's let's really move into OIT to slit to these low and slow desensitization processes. It's just fascinating, Doug.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

It's it's so fascinating.

SPEAKER_03 14:56

Right. Because you've seen it too. You've seen it firsthand from from your experience. And then what's so amazing is that we have these other people, like these academia people, like like I was, and I don't like to say I'm not academic. I try to stay very engaged, right? Associate, you know, for Tula and all this stuff, right? But it was like I was in a complete silo.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:21

It was just really interesting. And I'm glad that now I would say that after Palphorsia came out in 2020, right before the pan pandemic, even though Palforzia is not what a lot of us use, because we've been using other things since before Palforzia, it at least validated that OIT is legit. And so I am grateful to Palforsia for that. But it it's just a really, it's a really interesting history. And it really speaks to, to your point, about how patients really push us to do the next best thing, do the right thing, like try to find the next right step for them. And it does take stepping out of our comfort zone sometimes. Um, and then I can also see, not to go off on a complete tangent here, but would love your insight on this. I can also see how now so many of our future doctors, when they're being trained and when they're being hired, they come out of med school residency fellowship with so much debt, they go into a practice. So many practices now are either health system-owned, private equity. There's still some private practices, some small practices. Um, but when you're in that situation, it's very difficult, I would say, to take charge, say, no, we're gonna start adapting the literature now, seeing what our colleagues across the world literally are doing, and start having those discussions with our patients. And it's not that you're trying to push a treatment on a patient. It's that you don't want a patient to come back and say, well, why didn't you offer this to me? And you just say, Oh, well, because the hospital bureaucracy doesn't let me.

SPEAKER_00 17:15

Yeah, that's a non-answer.

SPEAKER_03 17:17

And but so many of our colleagues, I would say, especially our young ones, with all that debt, I think that's just one thing. That's just me having a though.

SPEAKER_00 17:29

No, there's there there's so much to unpack with what you just said. We we probably need to have a part two. Yeah, you're probably right. That is a whole uh that that's a whole conversation. And and it's funny where you mention early on there's articles, you know, saying uh questioning ethics when we were offering treatment. I would almost say articles could be written in reverse of questioning the ethics of academic centers not training their their faculty right now, not not even doing the training, not even offering that, or you know, not offering or not learning these options because right now they're so well established, and uh it's proven, I mean, over and over and over again, not one, not two. You know, we have a menu to pick from of of treatment options, at least in the United States. Um, I know that doesn't necessarily apply to to different countries, but um at least in the United States. Unless you're Doug Jones going on, yeah, but but but you're getting there, right? You're we're we're we're getting there.

SPEAKER_03 18:47

Yes, and how exciting was it that there's gonna be fast London 2027?

SPEAKER_00 18:52

So exciting, and and it's been awesome to see the London. Yeah, our UK colleagues um been so collaborative, and it's been refreshing, you know, to work with them, and and we'll be able to continue to see the expansion. So it's continue to open the door. That'd be great. I I think more than anything, we just have to remain patient focused, patient outcome focused. Um the whole winding story of food allergy, unfortunately, got sidetracked by perhaps other agendas uh outside of just patient outcomes. And that's why you kind of see a winding story.

SPEAKER_03 19:32

What do you mean by that? I I have some thoughts, but I don't want to assume I know what you're thinking.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Well, I think a lot of the the vitriol that happened early on was because certain I'm not gonna name names, I don't want to that's not who I am, I'm not gonna throw names, but certain folks were who were pretty strong about us not doing back then OIT, now it's like I just say food allergy treatment because of the menu, but back then it's like they were so against us doing OIT because they were on board of directors of pharmaceutical products, and and not that I can make accusations, but I but I just tend to think um if that conflict wasn't

Incentives, Real Food, And Trust

SPEAKER_00 20:18

there, would the recommendations have been different? Um, but the it was development of products that really aren't needed, and and a lot of us doing the treatment knew we could just treat with with groceries, with with retail food, real food, however you want to phrase it. We had that whole debate in the fast meeting of what to call it, but uh you know, with food. And and it's amazing what you can do and how you can change a person's whole makeup of their immune system with microscopic microscopic amounts of real food. And I I think that threatened various business models. And I think that's kind of where maybe the the agendas got sidetracked, and I'll probably just leave it at that.

SPEAKER_03 21:12

Yeah, and and business models and also just thinking about the way academics works, having to have so many publications, doing NIH funded studies, getting NIH funding, um, things that are amazing, and like my hat goes off to our colleagues who are successful in in that realm and work so hard towards it, too. But when you're super dedicated to studies and and certain approaches, then I would say as a human, it is hard to see other approaches and go all in on them. And it's not to say anybody's right or wrong or good or bad or anything like that. At the end of the day, the anaphylaxis is the villain, right? I think I heard you saying that. Was that you saying? Yeah. Yeah. That that That's the villain, right?

SPEAKER_00 22:01

And and how we prevent for the parents out there, Epi's not the villain. Epi's the hero.

SPEAKER_03 22:08

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

In the in the allergic reaction, Epi's the hero, not the villain. The villain's the reaction.

SPEAKER_03 22:14

Yes. Um but it's the more the older I get and the more I dive deep into this world, the smaller it is. And you know, there, as I mentioned earlier, they're not a whole lot of allergists. And then when you think about the number of allergists there are, not I would say the majority of allergists are not super focused on food allergies. Allergists treat a ton of things. They treat seasonal allergies, asthma, food allergies, eczema. Also, hello, that whole immune deficiency world that is just completely mind-boggling to me, the way our colleagues who who specialize in primary immunodeficiency disorders, um, that's amazing to me. I was trained in it. We all were, right? But there's just so much information that a board-certified allergist immunologist needs to know, treating children and adults, that it's only natural for some people to niche down in certain areas. It's very difficult to stay super up to date on all of those different conditions, which is in part why in my clinical practice, I literally just do food allergy, right? Because that is where I am dedicating my professional time and energy. And it is enough, right? Like it is, it is enough. Um, but it's it's a small world. And what's been so beautiful is seeing more and more people come to the FAST meeting and having more and more colleagues reach out to us saying, Hey, how can I do this? Or this is this is this patient situation. I mean, just our email list of what is it, 700 plus allergists, advanced practice providers, um sharing cases. It's really a beautiful thing to see such open discussion, sharing of information respectfully, even though there are definitely things that I mean, in our room, there were definitely times that there were disagreements. But at the end of the day, we're all still sharing information and trying to get the right best next step for our patients.

SPEAKER_00 24:38

I agree. And I I think the the our the fast or food allergy support team, our our annual conference and just the email list, those two things took the allergists trying to do this in the world from being siloed to a best practices collaborative community. A million percent. And and and that's that is a massive difference, you know, when you feel like you're in a silo or on your own. And what do I do in these cases? Um, because doing OIT or any kind of food allergy treatment, it's not like a straight line, you know, it's um the there's it's I often liken it to flying, and you get sometimes you got to change altitudes, sometimes you have to fly around a storm or you have to you encounter turbulence that that you weren't quite aware of or did predict. And and we have to navigate all those things and we want to do it safely for the patient. And sometimes if you're the only one in that seat, it can be nerve-wracking. But if you have a room full of co-pilots around you that are able to say, hey, what about this? What about this? What about this? You don't feel that alone anymore. And it's like, okay, I got this, I got this. And and feeling siloed to now feeling you're in a collaborative community of experts that are really striving for best practices makes all the difference.

SPEAKER_03 26:04

I completely agree. Completely agree. Kind of dovetailing onto that, let's talk a little bit about the nuance of management, heterogeneity of food allergy management, um, definitions of different terms that that we use. Um, you know, you're on social. You gave a really great presentation at FAST that I was mentioning to you last night when I was texting you, like, we we've got to do a training for fellows and and other clinicians on like how do you do that consultation with a family. Um, and what I was struck by was that what you were laying out was very similar to what I do. And asking a patient what their goals are is so critical. Um, but let's talk more about that nuance in management.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

It's so critical because we we live in a world built on 15 and second hooked clips on social media. You know, and

Nuance, Goals, And Patient Context

SPEAKER_00 27:12

and it's that hook and can we get them to stay on the page versus scrolling? That that's what a world revolves around, right? And and if you go too long, they're scrolling, and people are now conditioned that they have to get this one simple answer, you know, in 15 seconds. And unfortunately, when you deal with real people and health and science and and something that may be complex, uh, those aren't always the best answers. And and especially in food allergy, it's so individualized and nuanced. We have to have those conversations. And the the other thing is that I find funny is if you if you ever watch like patients, for instance, try and kind of convey their story online. I don't think it'd be a rare event that they actually tell the whole story. They're telling the story that they want the audience to hear, which is okay. That is totally fine. But with the doc, you have to tell the whole story and they have to know the whole thing. It'd be and and that's why I think it's not helpful a lot of times to compare online. It's because there is nuance, there are differences, there might be things that aren't being conveyed that uh are critical to the story. Right. Um but when somebody's in the room, uh you have to get all the details, you have to have the nuance, you have to understand them first as a as a human, not just as a food allergy patient. You gotta understand them as a human and and what they're bringing, what uh, you know, you have to understand what their goals are, but also what what problem are they trying to solve and what what's realistic? What can be done? Right. What kind of past trauma are they bringing or anxiety are they bringing? Um, what access do they have? What do they even want to do? Again, getting back to the goals. And we have to take all that into account with on the clinical side, their age, how many foods they're allergic to, what they're allergic to. Do they have asthma? Do they have severe eczema? Do they have a history of hives? Do they have EOE? Do they have, you know, severe anxiety? Like what are their so you gotta blend those. Uh, and you know, decisions are made at the intersection of that mesh of nuance uh within people. But it's I think it's just critical that we approach it that way.

SPEAKER_03 29:47

I completely agree. And in having discussions with patients, terminology is also really important. And that's something that we discussed at the FAS meeting. Um, I remember on one of the panels I said something, and then Dr. Washerman said something. I was like, well, I don't really like that term.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

And um That's why it yeah, in the in the meeting, I I uh on the on the presentation I gave for for the audience, I had a slide and it had all the different terms of remission, desensitization, sustained unresponsiveness, biotproof, free eating.

SPEAKER_03 30:24

Um you're gonna add tolerance preservation now.

SPEAKER_00 30:27

Tolerance. Yeah, right. Like I just kind of put up a smattering of terms, and we could continue to add, and and I and uh, you know, this is a room full of allergists, and I said we can't even agree on the definition of these terms.

SPEAKER_03 30:40

Allergists who are focused on food allergy and do advanced treatments. You're right.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

And and so the point was we have our definition, the patient has their understanding, and we have to make sure we're speaking the same language to start with. Absolutely have to speak the same language and and understand, okay, when the patient says this, like my goal is bite-proof or whatever, or my goal is food freedom or free eating. Okay, let's hone in on what does that exactly mean?

SPEAKER_03 31:13

Right. What does that mean to you? To you, there is no, as we've talked on this show about before, there is no medical definition of bite-proof or bites or free eat them or eating or food freedom or all of these things. And so to your point, the it's critically important to sit down with your patients and and have that genuine human-to-human conversation about the information information they're bringing in to the discussion because because they may have been listening to something very evidence-based and come in very well educated. They might be listening to something not evidence-based, and you might be just completely like rocking their world with what you're telling them. They might be a patient who for years has been told, well, there's nothing we can do about your child's egg allergy. You just have to avoid egg. And meanwhile, you get the history, you check labs, you do an ingestion challenge, and the next thing you know, they're they're eating baked egg, they're working up the ladder to then eat scrambled egg completely life-changing after being told for so long, well, there's nothing we can do. And then what I also see, I'm sure you do too, is once an allergist has said, well, here's your EpiPen, just avoid it. Then sometimes those families don't go back to allergists. And I'm seeing that a lot right now in our college age, like later teens, college age kids. And that can be so, I don't want to say dangerous. You know, I'm not a fear-mongering person, but those kids, young adults, are the ones that we really need to get good evidence-based information into because that's the same generation of, well, just give Benadryl and wait and see if it gets better. And the last thing you want in a teen or, you know, young 20s in college, might go have drinks, have an accidental ingestion. And then they're thinking, oh, well, I just need to give Benadryl. And they don't even have an epinephrine auto injector or nasal device, whatever, because so many moons ago, they were told, oh, well, there's nothing we can do. And so they're like, well, if there's nothing this doctor can do for me, then why would I go back to them?

SPEAKER_00 33:33

Yeah, exactly. And they often think, why? And then also if they do see other things happening, it kind of creates some distrust. Like, you know, wait, I'm seeing this happening over here. They're saying nothing can be done. That's not adding up. Right. So there's kind of some distrust that that can be created.

SPEAKER_03 33:57

A million percent. A million percent. And we we talked about um in my presentation with Farah, we talked about the importance of us as allergists ethically marketing what we're doing. Because if we do not share with our communities that we have potential solutions to your family's problems, then we are doing our communities a disservice. What that doesn't mean is that we should make outlandish claims, like 99% of people in our program are cured. Things like that. And I reiterate to to our audience that when you're hearing claims that sound too good to be true, they often are.

SPEAKER_01 34:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 34:44

But being engaged with a board-certified allergist who does have

Terms That Confuse Families Fast

SPEAKER_03 34:49

additional passion, I'll call it, for food allergy management can really help improve you and your family's quality of life. Even if you are continuing on avoidance, and I think you'd say the same thing, Doug. Just having an allergist who's having conversations with you about, okay, these are treatments that are available. These are, this is your specific anaphylaxis action plan. Really getting personalized care for your child's food allergy, even if you are continuing an avoidance pathway, that in my mind is still progress and success.

SPEAKER_00 35:28

100%. You know, I don't, I don't ever want people to feel, you know, like they're doing something wrong if they're if they're quote unquote just avoiding. You know, that that's a pathway. And what I want people to feel though is is informed consent on their choice. And if that's the you know, that informed decision that they're making, great. I support that. Again, patient-centered outcomes and what are your goals? What do those definitions mean to you? What is what is doing treatment mean? What does not doing treatment mean? You know, those are all important conversations. And and if they want to pursue a can a life of continued avoidance, great, I'm gonna support that because I want them to feel like no matter it it is a shared, informed decision making. And I want them to know I'm there with them along the way no matter what. And and they have that. Because somewhere along the line, as people go through different phases and different seasons of life, their goals change. Yeah, their ideas change, their needs change. And if they ever change their mind, first of all, I want them to know what's available. So even if even if they've you know want to continue to avoid, great, I still want you to know what's available. So that as the season of life changes, if they have, if their goals change, I want them to know exactly they can come back and communicate that to me no matter when. And and they have that resource to be able to do that. And and that's kind of the approach you know I take with with patients is just letting them know what's available and what's there, what can be done. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:14

Well done, sir. Look, as we're wrapping up, um, I want to ask last question. What was your biggest like either aha moment or takeaway from the conference this weekend?

SPEAKER_00 37:30

First of all, before I answer that, I do want to comment uh your in your presentation, your line when you said, if we're not making it known or if we're not telling people what's available, you know, that's then we're doing them a disservice. I thought that was the greatest uh part of your presentation, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 37:53

I I thought it was it was a great perspective of yeah, we are doing people a disservice if they don't know, you know, what's available, or if they don't know what we're

Ethical Marketing And Training The Future

SPEAKER_00 38:04

what we're doing. Um so anyway, I wanted to uh compliment on you that because I thought that was a really important point. Because as most doctors, we're not really great at marketing, ethically marketing ourselves. It's really hard and it's it's unnatural.

SPEAKER_03 38:21

I shared that because that's how I feel, and I have to remind myself of that.

SPEAKER_00 38:26

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So I wanted to I wanted to tell you, I think that was a huge strength in in your presentation, and I think a lot of docs needed to hear that. Um I think the biggest aha moment for me was there were several people kind of probably more than normal in the academic world that attended our conference.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:53

And to see them actually have an aha moment of wait, we need to get this more into training, into our education, into our other national conferences, and to have their feedback and their desires to try to do that um was fantastic because we've kind of faced an uphill battle for a long time, and it was it was so nice to actually see them have an aha moment where it was like, aha, we can do this. And I'm like, aha, we can.

SPEAKER_03 39:36

Oh my gosh, I love it. I love it. That's an yes, a hundred percent yes, Doug. Oh my gosh. Uh it's gonna be a great meeting next year.

SPEAKER_00 39:46

It is.

SPEAKER_03 39:47

Many of us are are gonna try to go to fast London. I know my table, we all looked at each other like, all right, here we come.

SPEAKER_00 39:56

So this is crazy. So the our meeting just ended Saturday, so what, four days ago? I've I've already read all the evaluations, and we have our first planning meeting for next year tonight.

SPEAKER_03 40:09

Awesome. So we're taking all the yeah. No, thank you for inviting me to speak. And I mean, it was an amazing uh panel of speakers. It was it was great to hear from all of those people. Y'all planned a great meeting.

SPEAKER_00 40:29

Thank you. We I we love our speakers. Thank you for being so valuable uh such a valuable piece to that, and loved having you there and your presentations and not just even the presentation, but the comments and you know, and the the answers on the panel discussions. And I think the most valuable part is even just in the non-presentation time when you're networking and just newer allergists are able to glean on experts like yourself, uh, you know, and ask the questions and and know it's a safe space to ask the questions. And we're there to share.

SPEAKER_03 41:08

Yes. Like even when Dr. Wasserman and I were were discussing that, it was still, I mean, I have so much respect for that man, you know, and it's still respectful. And it, you know, iron sharpens iron and it it pushes, it advances. And then it was amazing to talk with with other allergists who haven't been doing as much OIT and or or wanting to try to learn and sharing perspectives and sharing approaches, sharing what's worked before, what hasn't worked all that well, and why it hasn't worked that well. And again, coming back to sort of nuance and care and being able to not just follow a protocol, but you're gonna have to adjust sometimes because not all patients read the textbook, right?

SPEAKER_00 41:56

Like, right, right.

SPEAKER_03 41:58

You could have the same aged kiddo with the same food allergies, yeah. Who just these two different kids need different treatment plans because of the nuance, because of the differences and in these different approaches, we could have a whole nother, we could have multiple podcast episodes, Doug.

SPEAKER_00 42:17

I know, I know. And and I think when I think the best teachers of medicine aren't textbooks, they're patients. And I think the strength of our group, I think the strength of this, the the group of allergists that we have together is we're we're sharing this real world experience of what we're learning from our patients and and then sharing and applying that. And so we're able to connect to the work.

SPEAKER_03 42:39

Sharing and applying. I have never seen a group of doctors apply information as quickly as this group does. And so much of it, I think, because we all have that heart of like, there's got to be something more better I can do. And because our patients, our patient parents, yes, they want to have that engaged discussion about what potentially could be more better for my child.

SPEAKER_00 43:04

Couldn't agree more. Well, so you're like dropping the mic right now.

SPEAKER_03 43:10

Where where can our audience find you online to get all the great food allergy information from you? Evidence-based, right?

SPEAKER_00 43:18

Yeah, of course. Um uh Instagram and I think most of my handles are just at Dr. Doug Jones.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:27

Yeah. Yeah, just go there and I or or they can go to the website, like if they want to engage with a podcast and and YouTube channel. I also have blogs on my website, which is just drdugjones.com. So it's it's all the same.

SPEAKER_03 43:43

So nice. I find blogs very helpful. Um as we talked a little bit about, we're both long form content people. Um and when when you're looking or when when you're a parent and you're looking for information on something, then you want to go somewhere where you can get more than a sound bite. And so thank you so much for creating the content that you create. Thank you for serving your patients, for serving your fellow allergists so that we can better serve our patients. Um, you're awesome, Doug. Come back soon.

SPEAKER_00 44:15

Thank you. I will, and you're gonna come on my podcast.

SPEAKER_03 44:19

Yes. Yes. I can't wait. I can't wait.

SPEAKER_00 44:21

Excellent.

SPEAKER_03 44:22

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.