VIDEO: Culinary-based nutrition training increases knowledge, confidence among residents

Culinary medicine, particularly when directed at cardiovascular disease prevention, can be feasibly taught to medical trainees, an analysis presented at the Lifestyle Medicine Conference showed.

Speaking to Healio, Nate Wood, MD, MHS, Chef, DABOM, director of culinary medicine at Yale School of Medicine, explained that physicians “are really poorly trained in nutrition — and as it turns out, this is really not a well-kept secret [as] since 1985, there have been calls to incorporate more nutrition training into medical school.”

Wood and colleagues conducted a randomized controlled trial that assigned 51 primary care residents to either a culinary-based training or control group.

Both groups participated in 3 hours of case-based learning, group discussion, lecture and dietitian question and answer sessions, while the intervention group received 1 hour of culinary medicine instruction over Zoom.

Both groups showed increased knowledge after the study, Wood pointed out.

“When it came to asking them about their confidence in providing dietary counseling to patients focused on [cardiovascular disease] prevention and treatment, there were really large increases pre- and post-[intervention] in our culinary medicine group,” he said.

Ultimately, “we need to do a better job of training our medical students and resident physicians in addressing nutrition with patients.”

Reference:

• Wood N. Culinary medicine for the prevention of cardiovascular disease: The first randomized controlled trial among medical trainees. Presented at: LM2024 Lifestyle Medicine Conference; Oct. 27-Oct. 30, 2024; Orlando.