Paediatric dietetics

What is it?

The right diet is essential for all children to reach their full potential. It is also crucial to the successful management of a variety of childhood conditions including food allergies and intolerances, digestive problems, feeding and sensory issues, childhood obesity, poor weight gain, fussy eating, chronic abdominal pain, irritable bowel syndrome, Coeliac disease, diabetes and more.

Who do we help?

Our paediatric dieticians support babies, children and adolescents and their families with advice about eating well for general growth, development and daily life. We also provide expert dietary advice to help manage health conditions or diseases.

This means we see children who refuse food and struggle at dinner time, experience constipation, bloating and belly pain, have an intolerance or have had an allergic response to cow’s milk, eggs, peanuts and other types of nuts, wheat, soy and seafood, and carry excess weight or are underweight.

We also see children with autism, cystic fibrosis, Coeliac disease, diabetes, gastrointestinal issues and more.

What do we do?

We provide expert, practical nutrition and dietary advice and treatments. We help our patients and their families to understand the relationship between food and health. We support a change of diet and the ongoing maintenance of the change in order to manage a condition and become healthier.

We:

• complete a nutritional assessment, and in the case of a specific medical condition, review blood tests and other results
• develop a suitable eating plan based on national guidelines
• support the child and family through advice and information to help them reach their healthy eating goals
• track progress against their eating plan, and fine tune as required
• support the development of knowledge and skills that allow the child to make the best food choices according to their health.