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FAACT's “Food Allergies in the City” Offers Clinicians a Window into Patients' Daily Life
A new 4-part microdrama series developed with real young adults living with food allergies aims to bridge the gap between clinical management and everyday life.
When Lisa Horne, director of marketing at the Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Connection Team (FAACT), described the premise behind Food Allergies in the City, she came back to the human side of it.
The series, a 4-episode microdrama produced in partnership with Genentech and Novartis, follows a group of young adults with food allergies navigating a night out in New York City. Finding a restaurant. Planning ahead. Running into an ex. Catching up at the end of the evening. Although simple enough for most people, for someone managing multiple food allergies, each of those moments carries an additional layer of preparation, self-advocacy, and social calculation that rarely surfaces during a clinical appointment.
"Food allergy education often focuses on the medical side—the diagnosis, how to manage and treat the food allergy—but there's not a lot of focus on everyday life: how to navigate dining out, dating, being on sports teams, going to school,” Horne told HCPLive.
Real Patients, Not Actors
The participants in the series are not actors. They are 5 young adults (aged 18 to 23 years) with varying combinations of food allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, milk, eggs, and sesame, among others. Their stories shaped the episodes directly.
What emerged were themes that cut across all of their backgrounds: feeling different, managing anxiety, and the constant work of advocating for themselves in social situations. Horne noted 1 moment that stood out: a cast member who routinely eats before going out to a restaurant because they cannot be certain the food there will be safe.
"It's one of those situations where if you are a parent or a guardian or you yourself have food allergies, you watch it and you feel surprised, yet not surprised at the same time," Horne said. "Because it resonates with you. And then you realize, ‘I’m not alone."‘
What Clinicians Rarely Hear
For allergists and other clinicians, the series surfaces conversations that often do not happen in exam rooms. Horne said that patients tend to focus on symptoms and treatment during appointments, and clinicians follow their lead. Topics like dating, kissing, sexual activity, and social embarrassment rarely come up — even though something as common as a kiss can trigger a life-threatening anaphylactic reaction.
“I think that individuals are embarrassed and afraid to discuss [these types of reactions],” Horne said. “Asking these broader...and more personal questions to open that dialog and bridge that gap between diagnosis, management, and treatment…opens the door to those conversations to give better care and a better quality of life to those individuals.”
A Resource With Clinical Applications
Horne sees practical applications for Food Allergies in the City in clinical settings. The series can be shared through patient portals, screened in waiting rooms, or used as a follow-up resource after appointments. She said its value lies in making patients feel seen and in creating an opening for conversations that may not arise organically during a visit.
She offered a simple prompt for clinicians to surface challenges that might otherwise go unspoken: “It could really be as open-ended as: ‘How are food allergies affecting your daily life?”’
Food Allergies in the City is available at foodallergyawareness.org. Genentech Inc. and Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation sponsored the series.
Horne has no reported disclosures.
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