Healthy Eating for Older Adults

Course Overview

This Ausmed Course examines the role that nutrition plays in healthy ageing and reinforces the need for ongoing assessment of an older person's nutritional requirements. Questions such as, ‘what should older people eat?’ and ‘why is good nutrition important as we age?’, are discussed.

Topics

• Management strategies for older people with poor food intake
• The nutritional intake an older person requires

Need

Adequate nutrition and hydration is vital to sustaining life, especially as people age. Unfortunately, many older people are not adequately nourished. A potential reason for this is that staff may lack sufficient knowledge regarding the nutritional needs of older people in their care.

Current evidence suggests that education to enhance the knowledge of staff in recognising and responding to older residents with compromised nutrition is needed. Paying careful attention to the nutritional needs of older adults in residential aged care can lead to a better quality of life, a greater sense of wellbeing and improved clinical outcomes for these individuals.

Purpose

The purpose of this Ausmed Course is to reinforce knowledge of the important role that nutrition plays in healthy ageing.

Learning Outcomes

• Educate residents and patients on why good nutrition is important as people age.
• Describe strategies to improve healthy eating in the older adult.

Target Audience

Health professionals working with older people in a variety of healthcare facilities, including respite and aged care homes, and acute, subacute and community settings.

Disclosure

No conflict of interest exists for anyone in the position to control content for this activity. Wherever possible, generic or non-proprietary names of medications or products have been used.

Educator

Yvonne Coleman View profile

Yvonne Coleman has worked as a dietitian for more than two decades in aged care, initially in the public health sector and currently as the founding principal of Nutrition Consultants Australia, which provides both a consultancy service to the residential aged care sector and is a micro-publisher. Yvonne enjoys the challenge of balancing multiple medical problems with medications and nutrition.