A Galion woman is sounding the alarm, after her daughter was served the very food that causes a life-threatening allergic reaction.
The incident took place at Galion Primary School in Crawford County. Kimberly Clark said her 6-year-old daughter had the worst allergic reaction to date on Thursday. The first grade student was served strawberries in apple sauce, even though Kimberly says she instructed in the paperwork she submitted at the beginning of the school year, that her daughter was highly allergic.
"(The paperwork) asks if your child has any allergies, what symptoms and what to do," said Clark. "And I put on there that she's allergic to strawberries, it gives her hives and to call 911 and then call me."
But she says, Galion Primary School didn't call 911, and waited until two hours after lunch was served to contact her. By the time Kimberly arrived at the school, she says her daughter was covered from head to toe in hives.
"It was so bad that her back looked like it was one huge welt. It was horrible," Clark explains. She says the school nurse retrieved the form, which she says, clearly states her daughter's known allergies. "The lady went in the back and looked at her file and said, ‘yeah I guess she is allergic’ and kind of snickered about it.”
Clark took her daughter to the emergency room at Galion Community Hospital, where she said, doctors immediately administered steroids to try to treat the allergic reaction.
Galion City Schools tell 10TV they require a doctor's diagnosis and recommended treatment to formalize student medical records, but they never received one. Clark says she was never informed of this, and if she had been, she would have done it.
While she says her daughter is still swollen, she's grateful she is recovering. "I might have had to bury my daughter if I wouldn't have got to her in time," Clark said.
Policies on dealing with food allergies vary across school districts. If your child has a food allergy, you may want to double check his or her school policy to prevent any accidental exposure and ensure proper treatment in case of an emergency.
