Nutrition and Food Sciences

The field of Allied Health is one that is rapidly expanding in the United States and in Southern California. The two leading healthcare trends in the United States are the increase in the aging population and the epidemic of obesity. Obesity is clearly linked to an imbalance in caloric consumption versus expenditure, thus, dietitians can provide evidence-based information for those seeking to address this issue. These health concerns in the United States, and California in particular, lead us to believe that we can serve the needs of our local and regional community by preparing entry-level dietitians for the workforce. Your CBU professors have extensive experience and knowledge in the field of Nutrition and Dietetics and are able to bridge applied and academic practice to the classroom environment.

Increased public interest in nutrition has led to job opportunities in food manufacturing, advertising, and marketing. In these areas, dietitians analyze foods, prepare literature for distribution, or report on issues such as dietary fiber, vitamin supplements, or the nutritional content of recipes. Linking the physical needs of food consumption with a desire to serve the spiritual needs of people is something that can be lived out in a very tangible way through nutrition and dietetics.

• Demonstrate how to locate, interpret, evaluate and use professional literature to make ethical evidence-based practice decisions.
• Use current information technologies to locate and apply evidence-based guidelines and protocols.
• Demonstrate effective and professional oral and written communication and documentation and use of current information technologies when communicating with individuals, groups and the public.
• Demonstrate assertiveness, advocacy and negotiation skills appropriate to the situation.
• Demonstrate counseling techniques to facilitate behavior change.
• Locate, understand and apply established guidelines to a professional practice scenario.
• Identify and describe the roles of others with whom the Registered Dietitian collaborates in the delivery of food and nutrition services.
• Use the nutrition care process to make decisions, identify nutrition-related problems and determine and evaluate nutrition interventions, including medical nutrition therapy, disease prevention and health promotion.
• Apply knowledge of the role of environment, food and lifestyle choices to develop interventions to affect change and enhance wellness in diverse individuals and groups.
• Develop an educational session, program, or educational strategy for a target population.
• Apply management and business theories and principles (operations, budgeting, human resources) to the development, marketing and delivery of programs or services.
• Apply safety principles related to food, personnel and consumers.
• Develop outcome measures, use informatics principles and technology to collect and analyze data for assessment and evaluate data to use in decision-making.
• Explain the impact of a public policy position on dietetics practice.
• Explain the impact of health care policy and administration, different health care delivery systems and current reimbursement issues, policies and regulations on food and nutrition services

Note: This program is currently being revised and updated for accreditation review. For more information about the program in Nutrition and Dietetics, please contact Dr. Meg Barth at mbarth@calbaptist.edu.