Getting proactive about allergy care: Cotham School, Bristol - Case Study
The days are getting shorter, colder and wetter, so to brighten things up, we wanted to share the story of how we partnered with Cotham School.
Founded in 2011, Cotham is a large secondary school academy converter in Bristol. It’s home to about 1,600 students from the ages of 11-19 and was graded ‘Good’ in all categories by Ofsted in April 2018.
Cotham had a decent allergy policy in place already and thankfully hadn’t had any students experience a severe allergic reaction - however, they still sought out our service and installed five Anaphylaxis Kitts across the school campus.
We met Ed Carpenter, the school’s Deputy Director of Finance and Resources, at the School and Academies show in Birmingham 2022. Ed expressed interest in what we were doing at a very early stage, and after a few calls post-event to mull over the details, in February 2023 Cotham ended up being our third-ever school to sign up with our Anaphylaxis Kitt service!
We interviewed Ed to find out why he partnered with us and for his thoughts on allergy care in education:
Why did you feel immediate action was required to tackle allergy & anaphylaxis at school right now?
“Even though we haven’t previously had a serious allergic reactions occur at the school, the needs of our students continue to become more complex, and parents are generally reporting that more students have allergies.”
Which of the following allergy management policies were you already doing before installing Kitt at your school?
“As a school we had a decent allergy policy in place. We managed students adrenaline pens, stocked spare adrenaline pens, and had allergy friendly catering.”
Cotham’s approach to allergy management is all about proactivity, with allergy-friendly catering and spare adrenaline pens on site.
What were the biggest issues/worries/pain points your school was facing in regards to allergy?
“Not having an autoinjector on hand to treat someone experiencing an allergic reaction was a big worry for us. Kitt gives us the reassurance that autoinjectors are now in key locations and can be accessed if needed.”
Where did you install Anaphylaxis Kitts in your school and why those locations?
“We installed five Anaphylaxis Kitts in Cotham across various locations: One in the first aid room, one at our offsite playing fields, and three in our catering outlets. These were obvious choices for us due to the proximity to food sources, business of location, and positions spread across the site.”
Cotham installed five Anaphylaxis Kitts across their school, three of which are located around the main eating areas.
Have there been any noticeable improvements or comments worth mentioning since installing Kitts?
“Since installing the Kitts there has been a definite improvement in allergy awareness, as well as improved reassurance that autoinjectors are in key locations if needed. We cannot put a price on being able to save a student's life, should the need become necessary. We’re proud that we’re now able to reassure the community that we can respond to allergy needs.”
So - What can we learn from this?
When it comes to school improvement, safeguarding, and allergy care - There’s always more that can be done.
Even though Cotham already stocked both students’ own and a spare set of adrenaline pens, and they hadn’t experienced an allergic reaction occur on site, they still sought out our Anaphylaxis Kitt service as a way to fully mitigate against any further risks.
They had experienced - like most other schools & individuals - stock shortages and short expiry dates on adrenaline pens, so the guaranteed automatic supply of long-shelf-life pens that our service offered was a hugely beneficial solution for them.
Find out more about our Anaphylaxis Kitt service for schools by clicking here.
The Anaphylaxis Kitt service can be purchased as an annual subscription by schools across the UK, providing emergency adrenaline pens in a secure wall-mounted kit, combined with online training resources and incident reporting.
