Dietitian's Journal

Thursday
Nov152007

Friday Round-up

I've been "blog-lite" (the techy term for not publishing regularly) for the past 11 days because I've been tending to other research and writing tasks. At the end of the day, I had literally run out of words or felt saturated by them so wasn't up to blogging.

I haven't done a round-up since late September (so much for my plan to make it a weekly feature) so my first post-hiatus post will be an annotated collection of links to food, nutrition and food-gardening items that I've starred in my Google Reader or stumbled upon serendipitously. I'm sharing them here in case you might also find them interesting and relevant to your practice or studies.

As I "mature" as a dietitian (I've been practicing for 20 years), I find myself studying food and nutrition from different perspectives. You may have already viewed my gardening blog within this blog. Some dietitians have a passion for cooking; I have a passion for sowing and growing. My dream: a food garden plot, or at least a pot, for every urban home because I believe our appreciation and understanding of food (really, life itself) is enhanced by gardening. So naturally I was excited by this concept:

Garden Mosaics -  a program connecting youth and elders to investigate the mosaic of plants, people and cultures in gardens, to learn about science, and to act together to enhance the community.

Speaking of appreciating food, here are my newest "foodie" finds:

Apartment Therapy: the Kitchen - this "sister-site" to Apartment Therapy promotes cooking and eating at home. I find the archives page the most useful starting point from which to browse.

The Cook's Thesaurus - a comprehensive cooking encyclopedia with a long-term Web presence

Orangette - "a blog-style collection of stories, often autobiographical and always gastronomical'; the Boston Globe says it has "great photography, writing, and unique recipe twists."

RD-2B and Ceci n'est pas un food blog are two attractive and well-written blogs by Canadian dietetic students that have impressed, inspired and informed me. They make me feel positive and excited about the future of the profession.

The political is another perspective from which to study food and nutrition -- the current "hot" topics and controversies. To keep abreast of these I read Marion Nestle's blog as often as possible. Although most of her posts are about U.S. policies and events, reading them triggers questions in my own mind (e.g., what are the equivalent Health Canada regulations?) and motivates me to look for the answers.

I was also intrigued by the passoniate debate about saturated fat (bad versus benign versus good) that followed Marion's post, Trans Fat Dilemmas. This is a controversy I want to learn more about, particularly because I provide education to stroke patients and families.

Finally, the writers of the 100 Mile-Diet blog consistently publish an interesting food story-a-day, and below are a few posts that I want to keep for future reference. I unfortunately completely missed out on the Wheat Festival, which was on Vancouver Island, but I hope it will be repeated next year and/or there will be a similar event on the Mainland.

"Locavore" Word of the Year
From Wheat-Free to Wheat Festival
Our Thanksgiving Dinner

 

Monday
Nov052007

Pre-and Probiotics in the Canadian Marketplace

(The second in a series of posts on Nestlé Nutrition Presents: Current Topics in Nutrition Support 2007)

In her Current Topics 2007 talk on pre- and probiotics, Dr. Reimer provided us with a list of products currently available in Canada, which I am reproducing with active links here. 

Prebiotics
Probiotics
    • Dairy products
    • Supplements
      • VSL#3®  -- a high-potency probiotic for the dietary management of patients with ulcerative colitis (UC), an ileal pouch (IP), and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)
      • Florastor TM -- contains Saccharomyces boulardii lyo
Monday
Nov052007

Upcoming webcast

Finally I'm writing about one my three November projects. This post relates to #2, the recently published diet and cancer report.

Today I received this email announcement from Dietitians of Canada (DC) that I'm posting here for DC members who may have overlooked it in their bulging email. The event sounds much too valuable to miss. Here are the details:

"This free Webcast is brought to dietitians and health educators across the country by the BC Cancer Agency, with support from the BC Cancer Foundation and in cooperation with Dietitians of Canada:

Diet and Cancer Prevention: A Global Perspective, presented by Dr. Geoffrey Cannon

When: Friday November 30, 2007

Time: 10:15 am -11:30 am PT (75 minutes). Check for the time in your area at the registration page.

Dr. Geoffrey Cannon, Science and Health Policy Advisor to the World Cancer Research Fund International will present the Canadian launch of the American Institute of Cancer Research's Second Expert Report, Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity and the Prevention of Cancer: A Global Perspective, at the BC Cancer Agency’s Annual Cancer Conference.

Register at this link: http://w.on24.com/r.htm?e=97154&s=1&k=6BBDA863CF28099210ABE506DD28152A

TEST YOUR SYSTEM: Once you have completed registration, be sure to "Test your System". This will ensure you have all the necessary and up-to-date software. If you do not, you can link directly from your test report to websites for free software downloads.

The broadcast is a real time transmission of Dr. Cannon’s presentation before a live audience in Vancouver. If the timing of the LIVE event is not convenient, you will be able to view the archived event on the internet for 365 days afterwards."

*Thank you* BC Cancer Agency, the BC Cancer Foundation, and Dietitians of Canada for setting up this webcast, a way of using high tech to improve knowledge transfer and dietetic practice.

 

Sunday
Nov042007

An evening snack for verbivores

Four days into November and I'm already diverging from my 3 projects plan. But it's Sunday evening and I'm just not up to reading fine print journal articles. How about you? I didn't think so. Perhaps what our brains need is a mental challenge of a completely different sort -- like vocabulary-building.

What theme unites these 5 not-so-common words featured on A.Word.A.Day last week?

Verjuice
Jentacular
Cibarious
Macaronic
Xerophagy 

Hint: there is probably some sort of nutrition connection if I'm featuring them here. Check your answer by clicking on these links: verjuice, jentacular, cibarious, macaronic, xerophagy.


 

 

Friday
Nov022007

What to expect in November on Greens & Berries

1508679-1130431-thumbnail.jpgIf you visited Greens & Berries in September or October, today you may have noticed the site has a new theme and header photo. I'm experimenting with font, colour and layout to find the most readable, attractive format, and also keep frequent readers (and myself) from getting bored.* I love food photography and am thrilled so many talented photographers allow their work to be used under Creative Commons licenses. This month for the main page I've selected a photo of my favourite November comfort food: soup. Not only did I find an outstanding image, but also discovered this blog for vegans, this delicious recipe, and an interesting, new-to-me food: cranberry beans

When it comes to reading (and blogging), I'm impatient and just want to get on with it, but I know I benefit from goals and plans to keep me on track. In yesterday's post, Leo at Zen Habits recommended Haiku Productivity: to achieve completion, limit yourself to three projects. I don't feel overwhelmed by this number. So for November, I'm going to focus my literature-searching, reading and blog-writing on:

  1. Highlights, summaries, recommendations and resources from Keeping Current 2007.
  2. References and resources that support the recommendations from the "diet and cancer report."
  3. My inventory of neurosurgical nutrition resources. (I've been focusing on stroke during the past several months).

I have the same goal for each project: to translate knowledge into practice; e.g., make recommendations--perhaps develop protocols-- on using probiotics in enterally fed patients; answer questions about "what to eat to be healthy", and evaluate and where needed, revise our unit's enteral feeding protocols to mimize the risk of aspiration.

I do very much like this Haiku Productivity approach. Be sure to check out the entire post for details on implementing it.

*And don't worry about getting lost. Even though I may change the "packaging" seasonally or monthly, the content and navigation will remain the same.