Food First initiative
Nutritional Management in Care Homes
The Food First Initiative helps educate and empower staff to optimise the nutritional status of their clients at risk of malnutrition. The Food First Initiative relates to the ‘food first approach’ which increases calories and protein through oral diet and drinks such as adding cream, butter, and cheese to meals, offering homemade milkshakes and extra snacks and puddings.
If you or your staff require training on the Food First Initiative & the MUST nutritional screening tool, we recommend accessing the ‘Forefront discover’ platform. To sign up to this free, digital platform, please contact Jo Tarn at Jo@nualtra.co.uk who will register your care home and give you a demonstration of how the training works.
Benefits of following the Food First Initiative:
- Reduce the risk of malnutrition for service users in nursing and residential home settings.
- Aim to reduce hospital admissions related to malnutrition.
- Reduced need for nutritional supplements and implementing a more cost effective approach by offering home-made milkshakes
- Empowering nursing and residential home staff to implement food first advice
- Increasing nursing and residential home staff’s understanding of MUST to help reduce the number of inappropriate Dietetic referrals
- Increased awareness of refeeding syndrome and the importance of the Dietetic plan
