Rare tragedy brings heightened allergy alert

Barbara Freeman was looking after their six-month-old daughter instead of dining with her husband of 18 months when he collapsed in a restaurant and later died after eating a tomato canape.

Coroner Murray Jamiesen yesterday confirmed the cause of Mr Freeman's death as an anaphylactic reaction.

The rare tragedy has resulted in changes to allergy awareness in restaurants and Mr Freeman's sister Donna Whittle expects many more to come after the coroner's report.

Grant Freeman, 38 when he died, was a tall, well-built man who made no secret of his allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, eggs, seafood and chicken.

When the couple honeymooned in Europe, Mr Freeman carried a card with crosses over drawings of his danger foods.

Whitfords Cafe, where Mr Freeman dined with Chelsea Sugar colleagues on April 17, 2007, was forewarned of his allergies and had prepared Mr Freeman a separate entree of cherry tomato with salsa verde a green sauce of parsley, salt and pepper and olive oil while his colleagues had oysters.

But as soon as he had eaten the tomato Mr Freeman noticed something was wrong, and a few minutes later went to the bathroom where he collapsed.

He was found in convulsions by Whitford's kitchen hand.

Dr Peter Dzendrowskyj, an intensive care specialist from Middlemore Hospital, said Mr Freeman had a cardiac arrest because of the shock.

He was put into therapeutic hypothermia - cooling of the body to protect the brain - but was in a "non-survivable condition".

Allergy New Zealand's chief executive Penny Jorgensen later wrote to the coroner and reported the case to Auckland Regional Public Health.

She believed several points warranted a more detailed investigation. Mr Freeman had not been aware of the potential severity of his allergies and risk factors and there was a general lack of knowledge about them.

Mrs Freeman said her husband did not know his allergy could be life-threatening and had not had his allergies reviewed by a doctor since he was a child.

He did not carry emergency medication or an Epipen, used to inject adrenalin to save the lives of people in anaphylactic shock.

Mrs Jorgensen was concerned that the hospital's decision not to refer cases to the coroner highlighted a gap where there might have been other deaths that went unreported.

An average of four deaths a year are recorded as anaphylaxis caused by food allergies but Mrs Jorgensen said this was not an accurate figure many anaphylactic deaths were recorded as asthma or cardiac arrest.

Dr Dzendrowskyj told the Weekend Herald an autopsy was not originally ordered because doctors were confident of the cause of death they did not have the details of what happened at the restaurant, such as whether there were traces of allergens in what he ate.

But in hindsight the hospital regretted this decision and in a subsequent case would certainly follow up with an autopsy.

Restaurateur Susan Humphries was adamant her business did not cross-contaminate its food on this occasion, but Mr Freeman's death was a tragedy she lived with every day.

The restaurant examined its food safety daily.