The Dietetics and Nutrition Department (DN) is an integral part of the hospital’s supportive services which provides clinical dietetic services and food services to the patients.
Our Policies:
We strive to attain the highest quality of care and service through the effective and efficient management of resources, systems and changes.
We provide and ensure the maintenance of a safe work environment.
We respect each other as an important part of the team and encourage open communication, creativity and participation.
We commit to the education of students, the development of the skills and knowledge of staff, and we support education in the community.
We encourage the realization of professional and personal goals.
Our general goals are:
- To promote individualized medical nutrition therapy in a multidisciplinary approach as a means to optimize patient care at HNDL.
- To offer nutritionally adequate, well – balanced, attractive, and satisfying meals to patients, staff, visitors, and guests with accurate diet modifications for patients as ordered by the medical staff and planned by a qualified dietitian.
- To provide ongoing education in all aspects of nutrition and food service.
- To maintain a safe and sanitary food service environment, according to the standards of quality as established by the Accreditation Standards of the Lebanese Ministry of Health.
- To enhance patient care by providing nutrition education to all relevant staff, through continuous professional development (CPD) and through audit and evaluation.
The Dietary Division is committed to providing healthy menu choices. The catering unit caters 3 meals a day and a snack to specialized floors, to an average of 110 patients, using a centralized system. We provide and prepare quality foods that meet individual nutrient requirements, catering procedure, hygiene and food safety principle, using the HACCP principles.
Role of the Nutrition and Dietetics Department:
The department works closely with other members of the multi-disciplinary team (medical, nursing and other allied professionals) to provide optimum patient care.
Our role is to promote health, prevent disease, and aid in the management of illness.
The work includes the following:
- Assessing the nutritional status of malnourished patients and those at risk of malnutrition.
- Calculating nutritional requirements of individual patients, and designing a plan of care to meet these nutritional requirements.
- Organizing enteral (tube) nutrition support as appropriate.
- Instructing patients, and their relatives if necessary, on the management of their therapeutic diet.
- Ordering special meals and nutritional supplements as appropriate for individual patients.
- Monitoring patients’ progress and outcome on nutritional support or therapeutic diet and keeping the team informed through attending ward conferences or ward rounds.
- Advising the patients and the team prior to discharge on the nutritional supplements to be prescribed.
- Arranging outpatient follow-up with the Department of Nutrition and Dietetics if appropriate.
- Educating patients being discharged on home nutritional support.
Follow-ups are also available in the outpatient clinics.
Conditions requiring dietetic intervention:
- Undernutrition
- Heart Disease
- Hyperlipidaemia e.g. high cholesterol
- Hypertension (High Blood Pressure)
- Liver Disease
- Cancer
- Diabetes
- Obesity
- Celiac Disease
- Stroke
- Swallowing Difficulties (Dysphagia)
- Crohn’s Disease
- Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS)
- Kidney Disease
- Diagnosed Food Allergy / Intolerance
- Malabsorption States
| Education :
The Dietary Division at HNDL is committed to education. The department conducts a 6-month dietetic internship program. The Dietetic Internship Program is a generalist program offering management, clinical, research, and community experiences. Training and ongoing education is also a major activity in the Dietary Division in order to achieve and maintain excellence in the provision of services. |
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| Dieticians in the outpatient clinicsWhether you want to lose weight or enjoy a healthy life style, our clinical dieticians in the outpatient department are always present to offer you expertise, resources and support.
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