Function Meets Food: Supporting Nutrition with Adaptive Tools and Simplified Kitchen Tasks

Presentation Summary: Occupational Therapists (OT) are trained to use the kitchen to teach life skills, with a focus on adaptive skills and equipment for work simplification.1 Use of convenience foods is commonly considered a part of work simplification. A study of physically active people with disabilities concluded that intake of fast food and instant and dried fruits, as well as sugars and sweets and salty snacks was associated with increased body fat and reduced muscle mass, potentially impacting life skills.2 Of related interest, a health care providers (HCP) personal use of convenience foods, including a large sample of Registered Dietitians, correlated with how often they recommended convenience foods to patients.3 The study questions if recommending low nutrient dense diets or does it take away from offering practical options that convenience foods provide? What if there were a crossover between convenience and nutrition? What can OTs learn from RDs and vice versa?

Registered Dietitians have expertise in food and kitchen skills, but they do not necessarily have adaptive work simplification skills. Culinary medicine can enhance the patient’s experience by adding healthy food choices to the conversations that occur during OT and RD teaching sessions. This crossover, or blending the best of both professions, is beneficial as culinary medicine interventions driven by both OT and RD principles can help patients with becoming more confident in the kitchen, including being more independent while optimizing their health. Improvements were seen in habits in a 4-week program for persons with physical disabilities, administered by an interprofessional team that included occupational therapy and nutrition professionals. Sixty-seven percent of participants reported reduced consumption of frozen, canned, and boxed dinners, 32% reported cooking from scratch more often, and 41% reported changing recipes to make them healthier at home.4

Both Occupational Therapists and Registered Dietitians address lifestyle choices consistent with the American College of Lifestyle Medicine’s (ACLM) pillars, including nutrition, physical activity, restorative sleep, avoiding risky substances, making positive social connections and stress management.5 There is support for OT in a whole person approach to adults with chronic health conditions.6 In addition, older adults are at risk for food insecurity7, often compounded by disability. Collaboration between the Occupational Therapist and a Registered Dietitian to enhance the nutrition and health quality of the conversations with patients would strengthen the goal of improving the health of our communities.

In this session, an Occupational Therapist and a Registered Dietitian/Chef will demonstrate how a recipe can be modified by persons with various disabilities that provide challenges to everyday food preparation. Participants will be able to see how adaptive equipment is used and how nutrition and convenience items are addressed during the demonstration. If the venue allows, audience participation will be encouraged.