The course should enable you to have the most up-to-date evidence-based knowledge and skills to optimally diagnose and manage complex food allergy in children and adults. By the end of this short course, you will be better able to:

• Illustrate the mechanisms involved in the development of the spectrum of food hypersensitivity in relation to specific case scenarios.
• Relate the underlying pathophysiology to the most up-to-date diagnostic methods and treatments for the spectrum of food hypersensitivity.
• Take an advanced medical and dietary history in children and adults with food hypersensitivity.
• Propose a differential diagnosis and diagnostic work-up based on the clinical history in children and adults with food hypersensitivity.
• Integrate the findings of the clinical history and diagnostic tests to formulate a proposed diagnosis in children and adults with food hypersensitivity.
• Formulate an optimal management plan in children and adults with food hypersensitivity.
• Identify and address nutritional risks in children and adults with food hypersensitivity.
• Design management strategies to address difficult scenarios in practice, both independently and as a team, such as highly restrictive diets, poor patient concordance, adolescent transition into adult care or high psychological burden in patients with food hypersensitivity and their families.                                                                         
• Critically assess current controversies and knowledge gaps in the prevention, diagnosis and management of food hypersensitivity, and how these applies to specific scenarios or patients.
• Communicate complex biological or clinical information related to food hypersensitivity to a lay audience.

Teaching delivery format
The course has been designed in an innovative format combining asynchronous materials (e.g. pre-recorded sessions, reading lists and web-based resources) to revise in your own time, and live interactive sessions both online and on campus which will include focused discussions and case-based elements. A range of formats will be used to encourage active learning, including expert panel question & answer sessions, group work, workshops, role-play, pro-con debates and scenario-based sessions.

The live online sessions will take place in October/November. We encourage participants to book leave to follow the live teaching. Asynchronous materials will be made available in October and a ‘course launch webinar’ will be held for registered participants to introduce the course and help you get organised to maximize your learning experience.

Going through the asynchronous materials should take around 25-30 hours of study, and we highly encourage you to review as much as possible before the live teaching. The live teaching sessions will take approximately 20 hours, and will focus on discussions and Q&A partly based on the asynchronous materials.

Key dates & provisional times (UK time):

• 16 October 2024, time tbc: launch webinar (Online)
• 24 October 2024, afternoon: live teaching (Online)
• 6 November 2024, afternoon: live teaching (Online)
• 14 November 2024, afternoon: live teaching (Online)
• 28 & 29 November 2024: live hybrid teaching (on campus or online)*

*The on campus teaching will be held at our South Kensington campus – where possible, live streaming of the sessions will be made available for those that are not able or do not wish to attend the face to face teaching sessions. 

Planned topics

The spectrum of food hypersensitivity (pathophysiology and clinical presentation):

• Nomenclature and Mechanisms of Immune-mediated food hypersensitivity
• Epidemiology of food hypersensitivity
• Microbiome: from pregnancy to birth
• Is there a window of opportunity for allergy prevention?  Practical management of early solid food introduction
• Mechanisms of enteropathy and mucosal inflammation
• The spectrum of IgE-mediated food allergy in children and adults
• Lower GI dysmotility disorders - diarrhoea, constipation and abdominal pain 
• Reflux and upper GI motility disorders
• Coeliac disease
• FPIES: An overview from mechanisms to management
• Other non IgE mediated food allergies
• Eosinophilic esophagitis: Controversies and challenges in diagnosis and management
• Thinking outside the box with food hypersensitivity

Diagnosis

• The first step on the diagnostic pathway - The value of a complete clinical and dietary history
• Foods involved in IgE and non IgE-mediated food allergy – paediatrics
• Tests for IgE-mediated food allergy
• New diagnostic tests in food allergy: BAT and MAT
• How to challenge? Food challenge and introductions in practice
• Tests to support a diagnosis of non-IgE mediated gastrointestinal allergy  - biopsy, pH studies, manometry, hydrogen breath tests

Management

• The Complexity of Food Allergen Labelling from Individuals to Industry
• Breastfeeding and milk exclusion in food hypersensitivity
• Growth and nutrition in food hypersensitivity
• The spectrum of feeding difficulties in allergy
• Psychosocial impact of food allergy and GI allergic disease - an overview
• Food immunotherapy - overview and expert interview
• Psychosocial impact of food allergy and GI allergic disease - real life issues
• Microbiome: Practical management in pregnancy and baby
• PRO/CON debate on food ladders
• Food allergy in adolescence
• Real-world management - Shopping for food allergies
• How to approach feeding/eating difficulties in practice
• Mock parent/patient event with the experts - student-led
• Hands-on' practical aspects: talking to a parent/patient, food challenges

Case-based learning

• Practical challenges in children and adults
• Who needs and adrenaline auto-injector?
• Coeliac disease: case-based discussion
• GI allergic disorders - There is something wrong with my baby. Case-based discussion
• Proctocolitis, food-protein enteropathy: case-based discussion
• Eosinophilic oesophagitis: Case-based discussion
• Thinking outside the box with food hypersensitivity: Case-based discussion
• Food allergy as part of a multi-system disease – Paediatric case
• Food allergy as part of a multi-system disease – Adult case
• Who has come to clinic? Bring your own cases – student led
• Mock allergy clinic
• Case reports critical appraisal

Please note there may be minor changes to the planned topics above.

The course is suitable for healthcare professionals wishing to improve their ability to manage allergic patients in daily practice including GPs, specialist trainees and consultants, nurses, dietitians, and also basic scientists and professionals working in industry in the field of allergy or immunology. 

CME approval from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) will be sought.  All participants will be awarded an Imperial College London Certificate of Attendance on completion of the course.

Participants have the option of completing an assessment component and on completion will be provided with an official Imperial College London transcript of results. Details of the assessment and deadline for submission will be given during the course. Please note that there is an additional assessment fee payable in full prior to submission date. Please contact us for further information.