Food Allergy Living Blog Tagged Results

Hi everyone! My name is Rob McCandlish. I’m new to Food Allergy Living and wanted to take a minute to introduce myself and tell you a little about me. I’m a Nutrition Specialist with Nutricia North America and I work with Christine, Mallory and Sarah. Among other duties, I get to talk with folks like you when you call us with questions about Neocate.

What to tell you about myself? I grew up in Winchester, VA, not far from the nation’s capital. Growing up, I had several family members who had Celiac disease (which means they can’t eat foods with ANY wheat, barley, or rye) so was always familiar with “special” foods, reading ingredient labels closely, and changing recipes to ensure nobody got sick from food.

I earned a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Mary Washington College. From there I started my first “career” coordinating organ donation and transplantation, eventually relocating to northern Virginia. I was fortunate to work both at the United Network for Organ Sharing as well as the Washington Regional Transplant Community. The best part of the work was that it allowed me to help to improve the lives of others, both directly and through speaking publicly about the importance of organ donation.

I then went to James Madison University to complete a Bachelor of Science degree in dietetics. That was followed by my dietetic internship at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). While at NIH, I got to work with many patients, including those with allergies. Other patients had undiagnosed diseases which involved unexplainable food allergies and sensitivities. Still others had metabolic disorders that limited the types of food they could eat.

All of those great experiences lead me to Nutricia. I’ve been here for a couple of months now and love working with families such as your own. I recently passed the Registration Examination for Dietitians, meaning I’m a full-fledged Registered Dietitian and can add the R.D. credentials to my business card! I enjoy cooking, experimenting with food, writing, and I look forward to being a contributing member of the nutrition team at Nutricia North America.

- Rob McCandlish, R.D.

Receiving a food allergy diagnosis can be a lot for parents to handle! Between trying to understand the allergy, learning what things to avoid and making sure your little one is getting the proper nutrition they need to thrive, it can be complicated and confusing. Even though I am a nutrition specialist, I remember being totally overwhelmed when my daughter was diagnosed with a milk protein allergy.

To help parents like us, Kids with Food Allergies has released From Confusion to Confidence: a Starter Guide for Parenting a Child with Food Allergies - a free e-book with articles, checklists and resources on everything related to food allergies. If your child has recently been diagnosed, or you are looking for a new source of information, I would definitely recommend checking it out.

You can download the guide from the Kids with Food Allergies Web site here. While you’re there, be sure to check out the other great resources available on the site – they have a great archive of recipes as well!

Are there any other resources that you have found helpful? We’d love to hear about them!

- Sarah

Hello there-

My name is Sarah O’Brien, senior nutrition specialist for Nutricia, and I’m really excited about joining the Baby Health Blog team.

I‘ve worked with nutrition and allergies for quite sometime now. About eight years ago, I came to Nutricia, where I’ve focused on nutrition therapies for kids with food allergies, gastrointestinal issues, metabolic conditions and neurological diseases.

I really like being able to lend a hand (and ear!) to parents facing these issues. But, I have to tell you, my line of work made the idea of becoming a mom a little scary for me! It’s kind of like reading way too many parenting-prep books and spending too much time with all those well-meaning people who tell you all the gory details about how painful their delivery was. I just had too much information.

But now, here I am, pregnant with my first child. And I do worry about food allergies and EE and everything else that my baby may be faced with. But the other thing I’ve learned from parents like you is that, no matter what happens, it will be very, very worth it. Because this baby will, in my husband’s and my eyes, be the most perfect baby ever born. (Although her perfection will be closely followed by my sister’s kids of course ;-)

I’m so happy to share information with you and be involved in this community. And, just like Steven and the other nutrition specialists, I hope you feel free to post comments, questions and opinions. But if you could hold off on all the gory delivery stories for a few months that would be great!

-Sarah

Happy New Year! As we start the new year, now seems like as good a time as ever to learn a little more about the Baby Health Bloggers.

Steven Yannicelli, RD, Ph.D
“Dr. Y” is a registered dietitian specializing in pediatrics and the director of science and education for Nutricia North America. He lives in Valencia, CA with his lovely wife and three beautiful children.

April Romano
April Romano is a nutrition specialist for Nutricia North America. She has also been a fitness instructor for the past 14 years. She lives in Germantown, MD with her wonderful husband and three cats.

Marybeth Savko
Marybeth Savko is also a nutrition specialist for Nutricia North America. She always had an interest in nutrition therapy for chronic disease states. She lives Bethesda, MD and enjoys traveling and all outdoor activities.

Any questions for our bloggers? Feel free to comment below!

As you may know, we have been really busy here at Nutricia updating our website, Neocate.com, reinventing our Food Allergy Living blog and trying to think of new and innovative ways to share personal stories, distribute information and connect with you, our most important supporter!

We know that you have read and enjoyed blog posts written by our nutrition specialists Mallory, Christine and Rob.  Well, we finally got them to sit down in front of a camera and wanted to properly introduce all of them to all of you.

Please check out their short videos on our NeocateUS YouTube channel! 

If you enjoy receiving information from Neocate this way (via video) please let us know by posting a comment on our YouTube channel.  We are already working on some more videos and if we hear from you, and you want more, then we will make more videos!

So, what kind of other videos would you like to see on our channel?

-Sarah

About a year ago, I started working at Nutricia in my role as a Nutrition Specialist. I knew from the beginning that I’d found a great place to work, and it is hard to believe how fast that first year has gone by. What is it they say about time flying?

Well, we hear from so many parents how helpful our products are, especially Neocate, and I thought it would be a nice twist to share a bit about what makes our company so great, since we’re more than just our products.


Dannon & Danone

Nutricia is a sister to a much larger company that you’ve probably heard of – Dannon! We also have sister companies in Evian and Stonyfield. These companies are the North American branches of our parent company, Group Danone. Danone is based in Paris, and this family of companies presents a great partnership for sharing medical research and working together to provide some of the best products available. This also means we and our customers benefit from the great initiatives that come out of Danone.


International

Did you know that Nutricia is worldwide? We actually have Nutricia branches located around the world, not just in the United States. Each international branch of Nutricia offers a slightly different mix of products from our global portfolio. Neocate, however, is offered by almost all branches, since it has been so helpful to so many families worldwide.


Research

One of the greatest things about Nutricia is our long and continued commitment to research. Since the 1960s, we’ve supported hundreds of publications on research into our products and many medical conditions. This means that we get to work with lots of researchers, many of whom are leaders in their field. This research has contributed to improving the way medicine is practiced, including the diagnosis and treatment of multiple conditions. We’re pretty proud of that!

Taking this one step further, we offer many opportunities for health care professionals to learn about cutting edge science from top researchers. We do this by offering free webinars, presentations, and by supporting medical conferences, making it easier for the folks who treat patients to stay up-to-date on current medical knowledge. 

On top of this, we now have a team of researchers based here in the United States. They are working on current studies for our products. This team, along with our international research teams, demonstrates our dedication to furthering medical research.


Specialized

One of the best things about Nutricia shows up as part of our mission: “Improving lives through specialized nutrition solutions.”  We are certainly not a one-size-fits-all kind of company. In fact, most people will probably never hear about Nutricia. Our products are specialized, meaning they are designed for specific conditions and disorders, most of them rare. This means we can focus our efforts and resources on providing the best products possible for those conditions, and for our customers! We also provide specialized customer service, which includes having dedicated Nutrition Specialists to answer customer questions.


Employee Support

Finally, it wouldn’t be fair to tell you how great our company is without letting you know how much support they provide to us, the employees. By being a part of Danone, we get to take part in training that makes us better able to support our customers, as well as to work better with each other. Nutricia also supports our education, such as going to conferences to stay on top of current research, as well as taking classes to improve our skills and knowledge.


Do you have a question about Nutricia, and what makes us so special?

- Rob

[Images: Microsoft Images, Dannon Website]

As you know at Nutricia we love to hear from our customers and we’ve made it easy to contact us via e-mail or phone. But today we’re excited to announce a new way for you connect with us – live online chat!

Our chat allows you to speak with either our Nutrition Specialists or Customer Service representatives. We are here to help answer any questions you have about our products, your child’s nutrition, placing orders, managing your account, and product pricing. Our teams are available from 8:30am-5:00pm EST Monday through Friday to answer your questions.

To get started click the "Buy Neocate" link on the Neocate.com homepage. Once you’re there you’ll see our Live Chat option on the lower left corner of the screen. Once you click on it, we’ll ask for some basic contact information and which department you’d like to speak to and in a few moments you’ll be connected with one of our representatives.

Our goal is to be here for you so that purchasing Neocate for your little one is as easy as possible. If you’ve given our live chat a try, let us know what you think on our Facebook page or below in the comments section!

We look forward to speaking with you soon.

-Christine  

Last week, the Neocate team had the pleasure of exhibiting atthe American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) annual conference in Orlando, Florida.  This year’s conference had more than 5000 allergists and healthcare professionals from around the world covering topics from T Cell regulation to Eosinophilic Esophagitis.

More than 300 healthcare professionals (HCPs) visited our stand during the show to learn more about Nutriciaand to try samples of the new Neocate Junior with Prebiotics, Vanilla.  Also, for the first time we introduced our new range of services offered to the families that use our products.  The new range of services includes:

1. Our Nutricia Product Coverage Navigator – a service to help residents of Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Texas gain reimbursement coverage of Nutricia products.

2. Our Nutritional Specialist helpline manned by professional experts to help both parents and healthcare professionals use and understand all of our products.

3. Our new and improved website Neocate.com with many new services for parents including our online diary and symptom checker.

4. Our Neocate online store where we offer customers the cheapest prices.

5. Our new Nutricia Learning Center (NLC), which provides new and specialized education for HCP’s to help understand the complexity of the many issues that a cow’s milk allergy can cause.

Here at Nutricia we really believe in educating all of our HCP’s about the services we offer so they can pass that information onto our Neocate families.

We wanted to say a special thanks to the HCP’s that visited our stand and AAAAI for a very busy but very rewarding weekend in Orlando!

 Hi there!  My name is Irene Czapary  and I am happy to be joining the Food Allergy Living blog!  I have been working with the Nutrition Specialists at Nutricia as a consultant for the last year, helping to answer your questions about Neocate by email and over the phone.  So perhaps we have already had an opportunity to chat!

I completed a Bachelor’s of Dietetics at the University of Maryland, followed by a Master’s of Herbal Medicine at the Tai Sophia Institute in Laurel, MD.  I have been working as a Registered Dietitian for the last 5 years in a variety of settings, however working with children with food allergies and intolerances is one of my favorite areas, as it hits close to home.

As a child and teenager I coped with digestive issues that were never diagnosed, and it was only with my training in nutrition that I discovered that I too have food allergies; once I eliminated these problematic foods from my diet I felt like a whole new person!  So I know how tricky it can sometimes be to get the medical guidance you need, how challenging it can be to follow an allergen-free diet, and also how life-changing it is when you find the right diet that works for your (or your little ones) unique body. 

For the last year I have also had the opportunity to work with a pediatric gastroenterologist, learning even more about children with food allergies, intolerances, and feeding challenges.  I hope my experience will be of help to you and your little ones!

- Irene