[A Survey of School Lunch Provision for Elementary School Students with Food Allergy in Seven Cities of Osaka Prefecture].

The number of students with food allergy is currently increasing. Moreover, the unintentional mixing or accidental ingestion of allergy-causing food materials in school lunches has attracted great attention. The aim of this study was to verify the current status of elementary school lunch provision for students with food allergy. We investigated the elementary school lunch services in seven cities in Osaka prefecture. The egg elimination diet was provided in five of the seven cities. In four of these five cities, we did not detect the presence of egg residue either on the surface of various cookware used to prepare the egg elimination diet or in the food itself. In this investigation, the egg elimination diet was provided properly, but we observed differences among the cities in the manual preparation of foods for food allergy diets. To step up these efforts, our results suggest the necessity of preparing a manual to consider individual conditions of school lunch services.