Opportunities for innovation in nutrition education for health professionals

Nowson, Caryl

The greatest impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been borne by those already managing chronic health conditions.1 These lifestyle diseases such as hypertension, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease contribute to an increase in mortality from COVID-19, which in turn are all exacerbated by obesity, also a major risk factor for the development of adverse health outcomes related to COVID-19.2 3 The population-wide improvement of cardiovascular outcomes seen over recent years in developed countries is now at risk of being overwhelmed by an increase in risk factors arising from poor lifestyle practices, including sedentary behaviour and harmful dietary practices contributing to increased rates of obesity, high blood pressure and an adverse blood lipid profiles. If health professionals develop competencies in supporting individuals to adopt healthy nutrition and lifestyle practices through basic and postgraduate training, graduates would have opportunity to make a significant positive impact on individual and population health.4 There is an urgent need to co-ordinate the production and delivery of quality evidence-based educational materials and resources, which can be disseminated across all health professional groups to ensure the development of nutrition competencies in health professionals in basic training, together with continuing professional educational activities. In addition to formally integrating nutrition into health professional training, the negative impact of the ‘hidden curriculum’ particularly in medical training that places greatest emphasis on treatment (with drugs or surgery), rather than preventative and lifestyle management of chronic disease, has been shown to undermine efforts to integrate nutrition in the medical curriculum.11 Patients may be more likely to improve their eating habits if their healthcare professionals have a nutritious diet,12 and integrating personal nutritional and behavioural goals for students within the curriculum has enormous potential for students to increase both their nutrition knowledge but also develop behavioural strategies that will ultimately benefit themselves and their patients. [...]of a greater interest in nutrition and food, medical students are now advocating to be taught more nutrition and lifestyle strategies within their training courses.13 This has been recognised by UK medical and health professional students who have established an organisation ‘Nutritank’, which has had a worldwide impact in raising awareness of the importance of diet and lifestyle factors to health providing further impetus for updating the curriculum.