Equipping Health Care Professionals with Nutrition Content

(Recorded 4/4/2018)

Speakers: Martin Kohlmeier, MD, PhD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill & Thomas Gregory Sherman, PhD, Georgetown University Medical Center

Healthcare professionals are the top trusted and most relied upon source for information on nutrition. Still, research shows that most healthcare professionals, including physicians, receive little to no nutrition training. Nutrition educators have the opportunity to harness the public’s trust and reliance on health professionals to increase the impact, and reach, of nutrition education programs. This webinar will highlight successful nutrition education programs for healthcare professionals, and equip participants with proven strategies to more effectively engage this group with nutrition content.

The session will begin with an overview of recent consumer research that examines the public’s trust in healthcare professionals as a source of nutrition information. Dr. Kohlmeier and Dr. Sherman will discuss the current state of nutrition education in medical school and share best practices for educating healthcare professionals about nutrition topics. They will highlight various channels and ways to reach future doctors, and answer participants’ questions.

Learning Objectives

Understand the current state of nutrition education for physicians and other healthcare professionals.

Learn from successful programs that engage healthcare professionals with food and nutrition content.

Highlight partnership opportunities that can increase the impact of nutrition interventions, both individually and in community settings.

Martin Kohlmeier, MD, PhD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Dr. Kohlmeier is project director of the Nutrition in Medicine (NIM) and Nutrition Education for Practicing Physicians (NEPP) projects (www.nutritioninmedicine.org). He has studied metabolic effects of diet and drug interventions and developed methods for the analysis of nutritionally related risk indicators in large populations. A major focus of his research is the impact of common genetic variants on nutritional sufficiency. He is now developing online tools to guide intake based on individual lifestyle and multiple genetic factors (http://nim.unc.edu/guidance/guidance.html). He is the author of a comprehensive biochemistry textbook (“Nutrient Metabolism” Academic Press 2003, 826 pp) detailing the molecular fate of more than a hundred food constituents. Dr. Kohlmeier is also Co-Lead of the NNEdPro Global Innovation panel as well as Inaugural Editor of the NNEdPro official journal, BMJ Nutrition, Prevention and Health. NNEdPro Global Centre for Nutrition and Health is an SNB affiliate member who will be presenting “Train the Trainers: Equipping Nutrition Educators with Knowledge Application Tools in Food Systems Assessment to Influencing Health Care Practitioners” at the SNEB annual conference.

Thomas Gregory Sherman, PhD, Georgetown University Medical Center

Thomas G. Sherman came to Georgetown in 1996 as Associate Professor in the Department of Physiology & Biophysics and the Division of Endocrinology & Metabolism in the Department of Internal Medicine. He is now a Professor in the Department of Pharmacology & Physiology, an Associate Director of the Special Master’s Program, and Chair of the Medical Center’s Graduate Advisory Committee. His research focused on neuropeptide gene expression in the CNS; however, for the past 14 years, his interests, writings, and teaching have focused on the endocrinology and biochemistry of metabolism, nutrition, chronic disease and body weight. He is an outspoken advocate for increased medical nutrition education. He is director of the new medical school course: Intersession 2 - Nutrition & Patient Health, and is the director of nine medical and graduate courses in nutrition, biochemistry, genetics, endocrinology and neuroscience. He greatly enjoys his frequent distance runs with medical and graduate students.