Nutrition

Expert assessment and treatment of patients with nutrition issues for Calgary and surrounding area are provided by our members of the Nutrition group.

Clinical services provided include inpatient consultation as well as provision of home parenteral and enteral nutrition (PN and EN) through the Southern Alberta Adult Home Enteral and Parenteral Nutrition Program which consists of a team of physicians, nurses, registered dietitians, and support staff.

The malnutrition clinic is a multi-disciplinary clinic that provides advanced nutrition assessment and management to patients with digestive diseases at risk for, or diagnosed with overt malnutrition. The prevalence for malnutrition is reported to range between 20-75% in patients diagnosed with Inflammatory Bowel Diseases and in up to 70% of patients with decompensated liver disease. Identifying malnutrition provides an opportunity for targeted nutrition focused treatments which may improve the natural history of disease, decrease complications such as infections, abscesses, hepatic encephalopathy, hospitalizations and death. Patients in the malnutrition clinic are assessed by both a nutrition focused gastroenterologist as well as an experienced registered dietitian in digestive diseases. Nutrition status is established using subjective and objective tools, leading to the development of a personalized nutrition plan based on clinical and nutrition diagnosis and goals of care. This unique malnutrition clinic has inspired the development of 3 other similar clinics across North America.

The clinical expertise of the Nutrition group is augmented by its involvement in ASCEND which is dedicated to research in nutrition for gastrointestinal diseases.