What can a dietitian offer to my AL Facility?
A registered dietitian (RD) can offer so many valuable services to Assisted Living Facilities and their residents! The dietitian is a crucial part of the Assisted Living (AL) environment by educating and providing expert meal planning to the residents to keep them healthy so that they can continue to live in your AL facility! The RD can plan the menu for whatever suits the resident's needs and desires, as well as educate your residents on the physician ordered diets that will keep them healthy and free of nutrition related complications. The RD can provide one-on-one counseling or group programs for weight control, diabetes, or heart healthy diets, just to name a few. The RD monitors, supervises, and adjusts the dietary department procedures for the continued satisfaction of the residents; and can also provide inservices on subjects such as hospitality, food safety and sanitation. The RD will provide nutritional assessments and suggest appropriate interventions for the residents to promote optimal health and well-being.
What is the difference between a dietitian and a dietetic technician?
A dietitian has completed a 4 year ADA approved program and an internship. A diet tech has completed a 2 year ADA approved program and fieldwork or a 4 year ADA program without an internship. Both must pass a registration exam with the American Dietetic Association to be given the title Registered Dietitian (RD) or Dietetic Technician Registered (DTR).
I am a public health RD. I was just approached by a LTC facility to consult for them. I think I am willing to give it a shot BUT I feel a little out of the loop. Your business seems to offer a variety of resources. What would you recommend for someone with a solid background as an RD but little experience with consulting contracts, current therapeutic diets, and other rules/regs?
We have a number of resources I would recommend to help get you started. Our Diet Manual for Extended Care is a great resource for the diets and includes a lot of additional information that is very helpful. Our Mock Survey book has all the food and nutrition regulations in it, and it's a great way to review all the regs. If you need assessment, progress note and care plan forms, our MNT Made Easy is a great resource. In addition, the Weight Calculator can help you stay on top of essential information for your documentation. We also have a number of CE programs that can help you learn all the essentials of the regulations, care planning, etc. And information such as Policies/Procedures.
What advice can you offer for an RD wanting a career in LTC?
Go for it! We need good RDs in long-term care. I would advise you to consider starting in a single facility and gaining experience in all aspects of the food and nutrition department. Join CD-HCF (Consultant Dietitians in Health Care Facilities, a dietetic practice group of the ADA), and participate in their electronic mailing list. Also, obtain a copy of the federal regulations from CMS, and learn the regulations and interpretive guidelines inside and out. Go to as many seminars as you can read as many articles as you can, and purchase some good resources. Learn how to look at the big picture, put good systems in place in your facility, and work as a member of the interdisciplinary team. Good education and support systems are necessary, as you may feel all alone out there otherwise. These support systems are a key to success in long-term care. Good luck, and I hope you do choose a career in LTC--our older adults are a treasure that need to be cared for.
I need to come up with a 30 minute inservice on "Nutrition and Hydration" for both patient care and foodservice staff at a 100 bed nursing home. Do you have any creative suggestions for how and what to teach?
A number of great resources have already been offered via the Internet. If you are looking for a pre-prepared program, we offer the Hydration: It's a Splash! inservice, designed to teach staff and get them excited about hydrating residents. It's prepared in Power Point with CD-Rom and Hard copies of slides, notes, posters, and other resources.
We currently are an 80 bed skilled nursing facility we have a full-time Diet Tech and a part time Registered Dietician. I was wondering if you had any insight on what the RD was soley responsible for, besides overseeing the Diet Tech?
Does your state have licensure for the dietitian? If so, call the Board of Dietetics for your state to get clear definition of what the Diet Tech's scope of practice is in your state. You can also look at the ADA website for delineation of duties for RDs and DTRs www.eatright.org. (Look for Standards of Professional Practice). Your RD should also be able to help you with this as the DTR is practicing under her protection and should be involved in setting the DTRs scope of practice and measuring competencies.
Do you have any information on QA forms, QI forms, monthly food cost forms and policy and procedure forms for dietary department?
We have a Policy & Procedure Manual that includes forms (there is a whole QA section).There are also many forms in our Forms Book (including cost control forms).
I am an RD who will be teaching my 2nd semester of nutrition class for a 9 week CNA program. Three of the 4- 2 hour labs are designed to teach about I/O (fluids %meal intake), feeding skills and special feeding skills. I have the opportunity to modify the labs if I choose and I think we need help. So what specific training materials would be the most beneficial to teach these labs?
I would recommend the books in our training section. There are quite a few that would fit the needs for your training. These are actually set up as Power Point Presentations with presenter notes, slides, handouts, posters to reinforce key messages, and additional resource materials such as policies, forms, etc. In addition, you may find some of our other manuals helpful: Policy & Procedure Manual and Healthy Weights.