Texas Health Flower Mound team help minimize patient's exposure to corn allergens

FLOWER MOUND, Texas, June 27, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Imagine having an allergy that lurks in products you'd never guess, one where you're so allergic even contact in the air could cause an anaphylactic reaction, a serious, life-threatening allergic response that makes it hard or impossible to breathe, or even to proceed with a routine surgery.

"I felt like nobody understood how serious my reaction to corn was until I connected with the care team at Texas Health Flower Mound," said Wendi Porter, 49. "They listened and addressed all my concerns before the procedure."

Deana Carter, B.S.N., R.N., orthopedic program coordinator at Texas Health Flower Mound organized multiple departments to create a treatment plan that minimized Porter's exposure to corn allergens. Employees from the OR, Supply Chain, Environmental Cleaning Services, Nutrition, Anesthesia, Nursing and the Pharmacy Department participated in the planning that took three weeks.

"We discovered that a lot of medications and other products such as hand sanitizer and detergent contained corn products," said Carter. "We also looked for the safest isolated room to keep Porter away from break rooms."

The Pharmacy team researched each medication that Porter's physicians expected to use, looking at literature and product details.

"The hospital implemented a strict procedure to test common hospital medications for corn products before anything took place," said Gurbinder Jassar, PharmD, director of pharmacy at Texas Health Flower Mound.

Porter's two service dogs helped. The pharmacy established a control test with the dog sniffing a plain gauze product that was confirmed to have no corn products.

Porter had both knees replaced with no complications in September and December of 2022.

"Having people acknowledge the seriousness of this allergy is difficult but the care team really went the extra mile and even further than I expected," said Porter.

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About Texas Health Resources: 
Texas Health Resources is a faith-based, nonprofit health system that cares for more patients in North Texas than any other provider. With a service area that consists of 16 counties and more than 7 million people, the system is committed to providing quality, coordinated care through its Texas Health Physicians Group and 29 hospital locations. The system has more than 4,100 licensed hospital beds, 6,400 physicians with active staff privileges and more than 28,000 employees.  

SOURCE Texas Health Resources

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