7 Allergy Incident Occurs, example

As part of every new hire training, the dining room staff should be well versed in the protocols to follow should an allergy incident occur.

This section will go through the steps of an allergy incident from start to finish. NOTE: this is only one possible situation, if any one variable is somehow changed, the end result would also likely change.

• Party of 5 come into the restaurant
• The host/ess seats the group in a booth in the center of the dining room
• The server approaches the table with a water pitcher in hand and begins pouring water for the group
• The server asks if any one in the party has a known food allergy
• One guest acknowledges that they have an allergy to dairy
• The server then asks: what type of allergy is it? An ingestion, an inhalation, a contact or a combination type?
• The guest acknowledges that it is ingestion only
• The server then asks what that guest is thinking of ordering for food
• The guest says: a burger, fries and a side salad.
• Once the server hears the menu items, they inform the guest of the following:
  • the grill they use for the burgers is used for all of food items, however, their burger will be cooked in a saute pan alone
  • the buns that are used for the burger do include whey protein, so the server suggests slides of Italian bread instead
  • the fryer they use is communal and used for all deep fried foods and that some of the foods that are cooked in that fryer have milk solids in the batter. The server suggests a different side item
  • the salad itself is fine, but the server lists off the salad dressings that do not include any dairy ingredients or components
  • Finally the server informs the guest that their plate will be a different color from the others being used to signify in the kitchen of the allergy
• The guest seems satisfied with the accommodations and places that exact order
• The order is placed into the POS system with the addition of the allergy notation
• Proper protocols are used in the kitchen and the kitchen manager delivers the plate to the table as the server brings out all the other food
• The server does a table check within 2 minutes and all guests are enjoying their food
• Five minutes later, the server checks on the table and the guest with the food allergy is having difficulty breathing
• While staying at the tableside, the server notifies the host/ess, manager and the kitchen manager
• The host/ess call 911 and the manager takes over the guests’ care
• The server moves the rest of the table guests away from the booth
• The guest requests their Epi – pen and the manager helps to administer the medicine to counter act the reaction
• 911 arrives, the host/ess directs them to the guests’ table and the guest is taken to the hospital for additional care

In this scenario, even when there are protocols in place, even the smallest amount of allergen can result in a catastrophic situation.

The question becomes: where was the allergen introduced to the guest for them to have a reaction? Was the cross contact intentional or non – intentional? Was it a lack of training or truly an accident?

It is now the kitchen manager, the dining room manager and the restaurant managers’ job to figure out the breakdown, determine intention, look at training materials and training practices, look at training evaluations.

If management is true to the practice of establishing the standard protocols, training to those protocols and evaluating employee performance based on these protocols, incidents like this are less likely to occur. In addition, if an incident should occur, the insufficiency will be easy to find and correct.