A personal view of Teaching Nutrition

The nurses are drawn from different hospitals in the area and include general and mental nursing students, the latter often male, while the former are predominantly female. There is a wide spread of nationality and more mature students are usually present. On questioning, few of them have ever reacted with enthusiasm to the idea that Nutrition is an important part of their training. They start the course with preconceived ideas and, by using word association techniques, it has been distressing to realise that the majority anticipate that the nutrition lectures will be less stimulating and beneficial than the more obviously sociological studies.