First of all, what the heck is nutrition therapy? Different dietitians do nutrition therapy differently and that’s ok. My version of nutrition therapy involves taking what we already know about your health and relationship with food, assessing what might need to change to improve your health and relationship with food, deciding what changes you want to make, looking at why you want to make those changes, figuring out a way to make those changes the norm in your life and problem solving any hiccups that happen along the way. I don’t sell any diet products or supplements.
The initial session will be 60-75 minutes and we will go over your medical history, nutrition history and discuss what you hope to get out of our sessions. We will discuss your nutrition history in depth, meaning your previous and current experiences with food and your health. We will discuss how you are currently eating, how you feel about it, what you want to change.
Follow up sessions are usually 45-60 minutes and usually consist of reviewing how things have gone since our last session. We’ll discuss how food has been, where you are with activity, how you are making food decisions throughout your day, how you feel physically throughout the day and weight trends. As I said, my approach is client driven so each client’s work will look a little different. We might spend time troubleshooting certain issues such as a new work schedule that affects your daily routine, traveling, newly diagnosed medical condition, your family’s involvement in your nutrition work, etc. We may also end up discussing other aspects of your day that may be affecting food such as activity, sleep and stress.
You will come out of each session knowing more about how your body works and what your body needs nutritionally. Throughout our sessions together, I will be providing you with nutrition education that will help you to base your food decisions in real science and not from popularized food trends.
Collaboration has been shown to me to be very powerful in the overall health of an individual. I feel it is helpful for physicians to know what their patients are doing with a dietitian in order to better understand the overall health of their patients and, as a result, how to treat that patient. If at any point I feel we need to discuss your nutrition therapy with other members of your health care team, I will always ask your permission.