Page 5 - Nutrition Counseling and Education Skills: A Guide for Professionals

Preface

Effective communication skills are essential for all nutrition professionals, whether working in clinical,
community, management, research, or food service settings. A major challenge is to learn, develop, and apply
the necessary knowledge and skills while practicing them in one’s professional and personal life.

The scope of practice of nutrition professionals is rapidly expanding to wider and more diverse audiences.
The Accreditation Council for Education in Nutrition and Dietetics (ACEND) standards remain grounded
in the core communication, counseling, and education skills essential for professional practice, which are the
focus of the book. These competencies are mirrored in international practice as well.

The Nutrition Care Process (NCP) is the basis for the Standards of Practice and Standards of Professional
Performance. The Nutrition Care Process Terminology (eNCPT) provides a means to connect practice
intervention with outcomes in the age of the electronic medical record.
Here are a few of the changes in the 7th edition:

■ The Table of Contents is divided into three sections: Communication Skills, Counseling for Health Behavior Change, and Education Skills.
Some chapters are reordered and renumbered.

■ Case studies are reformatted as a Case Challenge found at the beginning of each chapter with Case Analysis questions interwoven
throughout.

■ Chapter 1 reflects the expanding scope of nutrition practice in the United States as well as globally.
■ References are found at the back of the book grouped by chapter.
■ Instructor and student support materials are expanded and available on thePoint, the publisher’s website.
■ The standardized Nutrition Care Process Terminology (eNCPT) is no longer available in print, but electronically from the Academy of

Nutrition and Dietetics (AND).

Effective nutrition interventions are based on evidence-based theories, models, and strategies; clinical
nutrition principles; and the knowledge of a variety of behavioral science and educational approaches. There is
evidence that interventions based on theories are more effective than those without a theoretical basis and that
health professionals need to customize (or individualize) the choice of theory or model to the client’s specific
situations. Interventions that are based on theories or models, such as the Health Belief Model, behavioral
theory, social-cognitive theory, motivational interviewing, or the transtheoretical model of behavior change,
are found in the chapters.

The dramatic increase in overweight and obesity among adults and children worldwide is a major threat to
overall health. The purpose of our interventions is active behavior change in diet and physical activity to
improve health and to prevent and/or control a chronic disease.

Acknowledgments

We thank Hope T. Bilyk, MS, RD, LDN, Assistant Professor, Department of Nutrition, College of Health
Professions, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, North Chicago, Illinois, for her review of
the chapter on Communication and Cultural Competence. Diane Rigassio Radler, PhD, RD, Associate

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