When I read this, I could not believe
that this was being said by a registered dietitian. I mean that she
is right in what she says, but to say it publicly has to be daring.
It is so important that I am going to quote it, "Only
80 percent of the dietitians we surveyed did any pre-assessment of
the client's nutrition literacy, which makes it difficult for
educators to target their counseling so clients can understand and
act on the information they are given." Karen
Chapman-Novakofski is a registered dietitian (RD) and University of
Illinois professor of nutrition extension.
From a profession that lives by its
mandates, mantras, and dogma, this RD speaks very plainly about why
dietitians and some nutritionists are often ignored by their clients.
The attitude of RDs is so ingrained in their mantras that they do
not pre-assess what their patient (client) has knowledge of and what
they need to be taught to make the information useful.
I know that I am not surprised at her
findings in the survey. Here we get into using terms that are not
explained as well as they should be. Before today, I would have
thought a nutrition educator was a teaching position at a college or
university. On doing my research, this is true, but also encompasses
nutrition educators in hospitals and medical centers as well. Some
are also involved in business nutrition education, like agriculture
businesses Archer Daniel Midlands, Monsanto, and the food industry.
If the 80 percent is from academia, and
the medical arena, then this is why we get the mandates, mantras, and
dogma. However, I do think that the term nutrition educators is just
the latest phase we are going to have to get used to coming out of
the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. A doctoral student, Heather
Gibbs, has developed an algorithm that dietitians can use to
determine precisely what knowledge and skills are required for a
particular client.
I know algorithms can be very powerful
tools, but I wonder how this will help a profession that works with
mandates, mantras, and dogma. They seldom change and will avoid the
algorithm as they are not as interested in education as they would
lead you to believe. It could be that this may be about to change,
but I would not get too enthused yet.
Some patients or clients as they are
termed in this article need to know how to manage their consumption
of carbohydrates, protein, and fat. Many more need to learn how to
manage portion sizes and others need to learn how to read labels.
Then many clients need to be able to categorize foods into nutrition
groups properly. So with this algorithm dietitians will have the
questions to assist them in assessing what the knowledge is that the
client possesses and then teach the client what they need to know be
become more nutritionally knowledgeable and manage their nutritional
needs plus work to balance their daily nutrition.
Karen Chapman-Novakofski stresses that
until health professional start asking questions to see what
knowledge the patient has about nutrition, it will be impossible to
effectively teach nutrition and create a behavior change. She also
stated that until dietitians narrow their focus and understand what
skills and literacy the client patient possesses, they cannot deliver
information in a way that will be meaningful or usable by the client.
Dietitians must get away from the
education level of the patient to understand that the patient and the
level of nutrition they possess. Then the dietitians can adapt the
education to fill in the gaps and make the information usable for the
client. Chapman-Novakofski also said if you're the one being
counseled, don't be afraid to ask “how” questions to force the
dietitian to keep the discussion on your level.
The area Chapman-Novakofski did not
cover was how to get the dietitian away from mandates, mantras, and
dogma. Until these three areas are made useless to the dietitians,
little nutritional education will be passed in a usable form for the
clients.
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