Dietetics and Nutrition
Dietetics is the science of how nutrition affects our health. It is crucial for optimising patients' health and well-being through evidence-based nutritional guidance and support.
Image credit: Jacopo Maia
Dietitians and nutritionists at Mildmay Hospital play a key role in supporting patients' health through customised dietary plans and guidance.
Registered dietitians are qualified health professionals who assess, diagnose and treat diet and nutrition problems in society. They translate public health and scientific research on food, health and disease into practical guidance, enabling people to make appropriate lifestyle and food choices.
Dietitians and nutritionists aim to improve people’s health and help them make better dietary choices.
There is a lot of dietary and nutritional advice in the media, but not all of it is evidence-based and may not be from reputable sources. However, dietitians are the only qualified health professionals that assess, diagnose and treat diet and nutrition problems.
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Personalised Nutrition Plans: Our dietitian assesses each patient's specific needs considering factors like their condition (HIV, substance abuse recovery, etc.), medications, and dietary preferences. Based on this, they create personalised meal plans that ensure proper nutrition and support recovery.
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Nutritional Education: They educate patients on healthy eating habits, navigating food choices, and understanding how food impacts their health. This empowers patients to make informed decisions about their diet.
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Addressing Challenges: Mildmay treats patients with complex conditions. Dietitians may address issues like weight loss or gain related to HIV, manage side effects of medications through dietary adjustments, or create texture-modified diets for patients with swallowing difficulties.
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Collaboration: They work closely with other healthcare professionals at Mildmay to ensure a holistic approach to patient care. This might involve coordinating with doctors on dietary needs related to treatment or with nurses on implementing the plan.
Dietetics and Nutrition news
Research and Innovation
At Mildmay Hospital, our Dietetics team is at the forefront of innovative research, continually working to enhance patient care, promote sustainability, and contribute to the broader scientific understanding of nutrition in rehabilitation.
We are incredibly proud to showcase our recent achievements and contributions to the field, for example, 2024, was a landmark year for our team's research output and recognition.
Further details, including abstracts and presentations from these research projects, are available here
Thank you to all the Mildmay teams and collaborators from NHS England, Imperial College and universities for all the great work.
Low-Carbon Emission Hospital Menu Development
Develepment Chef, Andrew Politi (right) with the Mildmay team
At Mildmay Hospital, we’re actively contributing to the NHS's ambition to deliver a Net Zero Health Service by 2040. In October 2024, our Dietetics team launched an exciting initiative to trial a low-carbon emission winter menu—a practical step towards more sustainable, patient-focused care.
On 10 October 2024, staff from across departments and several of our patients took part in a vibrant tasting session, sampling six new dishes. The options were selected based on nutritional value, ease of chewing, and carbon impact, including vegan and venison-based meals.
This session was a key milestone in the development of our sustainable food strategy and was generously supported by Andrew Politi and Max Kindred from NHS England, who have been instrumental in helping shape this work.
Special thanks go to our brilliant King’s College London dietetic students – Urvi Halai, Charlotte Turner-Murthy, and Shaye McLeish – who worked closely with our team to develop and refine the new menus.
The new winter menu was trialled from 6 November 2024, and following feedback, we’re finalising the branded materials for full rollout. Additional tasting sessions and ongoing collaboration with our kitchen team aim to further integrate culturally diverse and sustainable options into our patient catering.
