Working with Allergen Groups

• About Allergen Groups
  • Allergen Groups and Account Levels
  • About Food Items Added to an Allergen Group
• Displaying the Allergen Groups Available to your Account
  • How Priority Allergen Groups are Identified
  • Exporting Allergen Group List to Excel® File
• Searching For and Opening an Allergen Group
  • Viewing Food Items in an Allergen Group
  • Exporting the Food Items in an Allergen Group to Excel® File
• Viewing Allergen Groups Associated with a Recipe
• Creating an Allergen Group with AI Assistance
• Manually Creating an Allergen Group (without AI assistance)
• Unpublishing an Allergen Group
  • As a Parent Account
  • As a Facility Account
  • Steps to Unpublish an Allergen Group
  • Republishing an Unpublished Allergen Group
• Deleting an Allergen Group

About Allergen Groups

The MealSuite system tracks food allergens from the following “priority allergen groups” (i.e., federally-mandated) identified in the USA and Canada:

• Crustaceans
• Eggs
• Fish
• Milk
• Peanuts
• Sesame
• Shellfish
• Soy
• Sulphites
• Tree Nuts
• Wheat

A priority allergen group can contain hundreds or thousands of food items (ingredients and prepared foods) and is owned by the MealSuite Nutrition Services team. In addition, your account has the ability to create its own allergen groups to assign food items to. 

When a person is assigned an allergen group, they will not be served the recipes of any food item in that allergen group.

Allergen Groups and Account Levels

As noted, a priority allergen group is managed by the MealSuite Nutrition Services team, and is available to MealSuite accounts to assign to people profiles. In addition, an account has the ability to create its own allergen groups. 

When an account creates an allergen group (i.e., owns the allergen group), that allergen group is available to any of its child accounts. 

About Food Items Added to an Allergen Group

An account has the ability to add food items to any allergen group available to the account (which includes priority allergen groups and allergen groups owned by a parent account). A food item added by an account will flow down to its child accounts, but not flow up to its parent accounts. 

Displaying the Allergen Groups Available to your Account

To display the allergen groups available to your account, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Tools & Setup > Allergen & Preference Groups.
    
2. The Allergens & Preferences screen appears, with the Allergen Groups tab listed by default. This screen lists the allergen groups available to your account. 
   
   

How Priority Allergen Groups are Identified

The MealSuite system tracks food allergies from the following priority allergens groups identified in the USA and Canada:

• Crustaceans
• Eggs
• Fish
• Milk
• Peanuts
• Sesame
• Shellfish
• Soy
• Sulphites
• Tree Nuts
• Wheat

A priority allergen group can contain hundreds or thousands of food items (ingredients and prepared foods) that is managed by the MealSuite Nutrition Services team.

These priority allergen groups on the Allergen Groups screen are identified with the logo related to your system (e.g., the MealSuite logo is seen for the MealSuite system)

Exporting Allergen Group List to Excel® File

The allergen group list displayed onscreen can be exported to an Excel® file. To do so, click the Export button at the top left of the screen (first screenshot below). When the file is ready, click the Download button to the message that appears (second screenshot below).  

Searching For and Opening an Allergen Group

To search for and open an allergen group available to your account, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Tools & Setup > Allergen & Preference Groups. The Allergens & Preferences screen appears, with the Allergen Groups tab listed by default.
   
   
    
2. If you know the name of the allergen group, search for it in the Search field. You can also use the Owner filter to display allergen groups owned by specific parent accounts. 
   
   
    
3. Click the desired allergen group. Its slide-out panel appears. 
   
   

Viewing Food Items in an Allergen Group

The food items (ingredients or prepared foods) of an allergen group are listed in the Assigned Foods section. 

You can filter the food items by showing or hiding the following:

• Food Types (ingredients and/or prepared foods)
• Display only foods in use in my account - select this check box to only display items that currently appear in recipe extensions, menus, personal menus or diet interventions in your account. 

You can search for a specific item by entering it in the Search field and clicking the magnifying glass or clicking Enter on the keyboard.

Exporting the Food Items in an Allergen Group to Excel® File

The food items displayed onscreen in the allergen group can be exported to an Excel® file. To do so, click the Export button.  

Viewing Allergen Groups Associated with a Recipe

See the following separate article: Viewing Allergens Associated with a Recipe.

Creating an Allergen Group with AI Assistance

A MealSuite account has the ability to create its own allergen groups to assign food items to. An allergen group can be created using ANDI, the MealSuite AI assistant. ANDI will take on the effort of determining the foods to be assigned to the allergen group, thereby saving you time and preventing omissions or mistakes that can occur if you had to manually determine the foods to assign.

To create an allergen group using ANDI, the MealSuite AI assistant, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation sidebar, select Tools & Setup > Allergen & Preference Groups. The Allergens & Preferences screen appears, with the Allergen Groups tab listed by default.
    
2. Click the Add New button. The New Allergen Group slide-out panel appears.
   
   
    
3. On the right panel, click the Create With ANDI button. The screen refreshes accordingly. 
   
   
    
4. In the Allergen Name field, enter a name for the allergen group (e.g., Blueberries), and click Next.
    
5. ANDI will list existing allergen groups that match your allergen name that you can potentially use instead of creating a new allergen group. If so, then then click the Use This Allergen Group button of the allergen group to open it. Because these instructions explain how to create a new allergen group, click the Yes, Create Group button to proceed. 
   
   
    
6. ANDI automatically generates a description for the allergen group based on the name you entered. Edit the description if needed. 
   
   
    

7. Click the Next button. Based on the name and description of the allergen group, ANDI will automatically generate a list of food items recommended to be in the group. 
   
   

   Review the list as needed. To not include an item in the allergen group, simply clear (i.e., uncheck) its check box.

   When you have confirmed the list, click the Create the Food List button. The allergen group is created, and its slide-out panel appears. 
   
   

   The final step is to publish the allergen group so that it is available to be assigned to residents/patients. In addition, it will also be available for use by any child accounts for them to assign to their residents/patients. To publish the allergen group, click its Publish button. The button changes to Unpublish to indicate the allergen group is now published. 
   
   
   
   

Manually Creating an Allergen Group (without AI assistance)

If you do not want to create an allergen group using the AI assistance of ANDI, then you can manually create an allergen group. To do so, complete the following steps:

1. From the left navigation pane, select Tools & Setup > Allergen & Preference Groups. The Allergens & Preferences screen appears, with the Allergen Groups tab listed by default.
    
2. Click the Add New button. The New Allergen Group slide-out panel appears.
   
   
    
3. On the left panel, click the Create Manually button. The screen refreshes accordingly. 
   
   
    
4. In the Name field, enter the name for the allergen group.
    
5. From the Type field, select Allergen Group.
    
6. In the Definition field, you can enter a short description of what the allergen group will contain.
    
7. Click the Save button. The panel refreshes with an Assigned Foods tab for you to add food items to the allergen group. For instructions to do so, start at step 2 in the following instructions: Adding Food Items to an Allergen Group. 
   
   
    
8. After food items are added to the allergen group, your final step is to publish it so that it is available to be assigned to residents/patients. In addition, it will also be available for use by any child accounts for them to assign to their residents/patients.
   
   An unpublished group appears with a blue Publish notification-button (first screenshot below). Click the Publish notification-button to publish the allergen group. The notification-button changes to black Unpublish (second screenshot below).
   
   Note: It is not recommended to publish the allergen group prior to adding food items to it; this is to prevent the allergen group being prematurely assigned to a resident/patient. 
   
   
   
   

Unpublishing an Allergen Group

As a Parent Account

A parent account has the ability to unpublish any allergen group available to it. When a parent account unpublishes an allergen group, that allergen group will not be available for use in its account and any of its child accounts. Note the following:

• If the allergen group being unpublished by a parent account is assigned to a person in one of its child accounts, the allergen group cannot be unpublished. Doing so will display the following message:
  
  
   
• If the allergen group is assigned to people profiles in the parent account that is unpublishing the allergen group, then the allergen group will be unpublished, but will not be unassigned from those people profiles. Only when that allergen group is subsequently unassigned from a people profile, will the allergen group no longer be available for assignment to that profile.

As a Facility Account

A facility account that creates its own allergen group does have the ability to subsequently unpublish the allergen group to not have it available for assignment to people in its account. 

If the allergen group is already assigned to people profiles in the facility account, the allergen group will be unpublished, but will not be unassigned from those people profiles. Only when that allergen group is subsequently unassigned from a people profile, will the allergen group no longer be available for assignment to that profile.

Steps to Unpublish an Allergen Group

To unpublish a allergen group, complete the following steps:

1. Search for the desired allergen group and click it to open its slide-out panel.
    
2. A published allergen group appears with a black Unpublish notification-button. Click the Unpublish notification-button to unpublish the allergen group. The notification-button changes to blue Publish.
   
   
   
   

Republishing an Unpublished Allergen Group

To publish an unpublished allergen group, complete the following steps:

1. Search for the desired allergen group and click it to open its slide-out panel.
    
2. An unpublished group appears with a blue Publish notification-button (first screenshot below). Click the Publish notification-button to publish the allergen group. The notification-button changes to black Unpublish (second screenshot below). 
   
   
   
   

Deleting an Allergen Group

If your account created an allergen group (i.e., owns the allergen group), then it has the ability to delete the allergen group. Note, however, that an allergen group cannot be deleted if it is currently assigned to a resident/patient in the account or any child accounts. To delete a allergen group:

1. Search for and open the desired allergen group and click it to open its slide-out panel (screenshot below). 
   
   
    
2. Click the Delete button, and then click Delete to the confirmation message that appears. The custom allergen group is deleted.
   
   Note: If the Delete button is not available, it indicates that either the allergen group is not owned by your account, or is assigned to a resident/patient in your account or any child accounts.