Tag Archives: FNH 381

Group Education Assignment

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The topic of our group presentation was counselling techniques in regards to supplements, specifically focusing on how to approach counselling clients in regards to supplements. As is often the case with group work, this process was a great learning experience that presented both ups and downs.

Our first challenge was choosing a topic and narrowing it down to one that could be covered in a short forty minute presentation. To do this we started by looking at what is current in the field of nutrition that we could see facing in future practice. After much deliberation, we decided to focus on how to council people in regards to vitamins and supplements. Once we had a broad topic we then had the challenge of narrowing it down. After further brain storming we decided to focus on two extremes of potential clients we might have, one being someone who does not want to take supplements, and someone who does, and how to incorporate the method of Rolling with Resistance to successfully council them. We also decided to touch on the topic of when it is appropriate to recommend supplements, and when we should encourage a dietary approach. Overall this process gave us more experience in developing topics that are within the scope of the given presentation.

Our second stumbling block came with the logistics of trying to organize a time and place that would work for all six group members to meet. Although this was already a challenging task given the short time frame to complete the assignment, the fact that our group members live quite far apart was also a challenge. We were however to resolve this difficulty in the end through negotiation and the use of google docs. This is a good lesson as in the future we will be working in diverse teams of healthcare professionals that have different schedules that may be hard to coordinate. Having experience in being flexible and creative in planning I believe will be beneficial in such circumstances

The final challenge we faced was all agreeing on exactly what we wanted to include in the presentation. Working in a group of six people, it is inevitable that people are going to have different ideas on what to include in the presentation. Although we had a few difficulties agreeing on what to include, in the end we came to a compromise, that everyone felt comfortable with. This is another scenario that will be seen in future practice. Whenever groups of people are working together such as in an inter-professional healthcare team, there are going to be different opinions and having the experience of negotiating through such situations will be very valuable.

Overall planning this class presentation was a great learning experience that enabled us to further develop a number of different skills that we can utilize in our future careers as Dietitian’s.

Group 2 Education Presentation

Consumer Article Writing Experience

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For this assignment we were tasked with writing a five hundred word consumer based article about the health benefits of fish oil. Writing the article was much more of a challenge than I originally expected. When my partner and I were first looking over the assignment, we thought it would be relatively simple to write a five hundred-word document. Although this was our preconception about the assignment, it was definitely not the case, as we faced a number of challenges throughout the writing process.

Our first challenge arose when it came to narrowing down the scope of our topic. Because our topic choices were quite broad including carbohydrates and the Glycemic Index, health benefits of popular foods, or benefits of fish oil. Once we chose that we were going to focus our article on the health benefits of fish oil, we then had the task of determining what aspect of the topic we were going to focus on given the short length of the article. Taking such a broad topic as fish oil and narrowing it down to a topic that could be covered well in five hundred words, and would be relevant to people today was quite a challenge. To overcome this problem, we decided to look and see what types of consumer articles on our topic are already out there to ensure that ours did not overlap. Upon doing some research, we found that there was less information out there on fish oil, and decided to make this the focus of our article.

Our second challenge arose when we had decided on a topic and were looking for reliable sources of information. A problem I have come across in both this assignment and others is knowing whether or not the information being sourced is reliable. To avoid this problem, we decided to only use peer reviewed articles sourced through .

Another problem we faced was taking scientific articles, which are often loaded with jargon, and technical terms that are not always known by the consumer. To write this article at a grade six reading level, we tried to reflect back on consumer articles we have read about topics that are outside of out field of expertise, and tried to model ours on such articles. Once we got into this mindset, it became much easier to take the complex language from the articles, and translate it into an article that would relay the information to the consumer.

The last difficulty we faced was ensuring that we included meaningful information into the short space provided. It was very difficult to take the broad scope of information from the articles that we looked at, and determine what was the most important information to include in the article. To determine this, we tried to look at the information from consumers prospective to try and imagine what they would find the most relevant. Once we shifted our mind set, it made sifting through the information much simpler.

Overall writing this article on the health benefits of fish oil was a challenge, but one that got us to push outside of our comfort zones, and gave us an invaluable experience that will help us as we move forward into our careers as Dietitian’s.

 

Dosanjh, Ellis Consumer Article first draft

Dosanjh, Ellis Consumer Article second draft-2

Nutrition Counselling Assignment

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The nutrition counseling assignment was a very enlightening experience that took me through a variety of emotions.

Before starting this course and completing my preliminary interview, I was very nervous in my abilities to provide a meaningful experience for my client. Although I recognized that this assignment was intended to allow a learning experience, I still wanted to ensure that I provide the client with some useful tools or information so they felt that is was a meaningful activity. I would have to say that my greatest concern was that I would have the skills and confidence to successfully carry out the nutrition counseling session. To calm my nerves, I just kept telling myself that this is my first experience counseling a patient and that it is not going to be perfect because I am still learning. I also continued to tell myself that although I will get more comfortable in this role it is never going to be perfect as there is always something else to learn, and new skills to acquire.

The preliminary counseling session had a couple of unexpected experiences, and thus did not go according to plan. The original time and date agreed upon for the initial interview failed to come to fruition due to a scheduling mishap. Because of this I was unable to complete the preliminary interview before the in class debriefing session. Although this initially felt disastrous, upon reflection it was actually a valuable learning experience. In practice there are inevitably going to be times where I will have clients change appointments at the last minute, or not show up all together. This experience taught me that in the end it is not a disaster as appointments can always be rescheduled. Luckily I was able to re-schedule with my client as to complete the preliminary interview, even though it was after the initial dead line

After the Scheduling mishap, the preliminary counseling session went very well! My client had quite a unique situation in that she was dealing with some troubles with disordered eating. Initially, I thought this might be too great in scope for me to handle due to my limited knowledge, but I thought it would be a good challenge. As soon as I started the counseling session, all of my nerves were put at ease. The client was very friendly and open, and was very keen to participate in the session. Although the client description had mentioned disordered eating, I soon came to discover that the client had already overcome a number of struggles, and was looking for more tools to help her continue down her road to wellness. This experience introduced me to the notion that all though a case may seem one way, they can often end up being completely different. It taught me to come into every situation prepared, but open minded to expect the unexpected.

The follow up session went equally well. From my first session with my client, I sensed that she was looking for some tools to help her establish a healthy relationship with food. To prepare for the follow up session, I gathered a few resources related to the food groups as well as portion control, but I decided to leave the format of the session open ended to enable her to ask any questions she may have. This proved to work out well, as the client was very appreciative of the resources I brought, but seemed to be more interested in having a number of her questions answered.

This whole experience taught me the importance of coming into each counseling session open minded, and tailoring the counseling approach to suit the needs of each client. Overall, this experience more than any other made me very excited to start my career as a Dietitian!

Nutrition Workshop

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For our nutrition workshop Kelsey and I visited Ridgeway Elementary in North Vancouver. The topic of our workshop was lower sugar drinks and healthy snacks. Over all the workshop went really well and provided a great learning experience for both of us!

Dosanjh, Ellis Lesson Plan 2015

Welcome!

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Hello everyone and thank-you for visiting my blog! This is an exciting endeavour for me as this will be my outlet to share all of my experiences as I go through the Dietetics program! Stay tuned for updates as I embark on my journey to becoming a Registered Dietitian!