5^th European Nutrition and Dietetics Conference

Biography

Biography: Raymond Gemen

Abstract

Dietetic practice involves more than just the delivery of nutrition and bodyweight related advice. Dietetic practice is essentially involved in the complex processes of encouraging and supporting behavior change and maintenance. Recent work on the myPace project has sought to articulate emerging perspectives in behavior change theory and consider their application to both dietetic practice and the design of digital resources to support dietitians using behavior change in their practice. The Behavior Change Techniques Taxonomy, developed mainly for research purposes at the University College London, served as a basis. We conducted interactive workshops with leading European dietitians and a survey of 585 dietitians across 27 European countries to determine dietitian requirements for digital support in applying behavior change techniques in their practice. These procedures identified the behavior change techniques dietitians use most often and those they would like to know more about. Tutorial videos were found to be the preferred mode of delivery for the digital resources. We identified and sorted 10 behavior change priorities to be addressed in our digital resources for dietitians. Both the development of the video outlines and the scenarios, as well as the recording of the actual videos, was done by dietitians to ensure the relevance and applicability of the behavior change techniques in practice. The behavioral components of the videos were developed with behavior change experts. The digital resources, developed to support not only dietitians but also other health professionals who use behavior change in practice, will be made available free of charge and hosted on the website of the European Federation of Associations of Dietitians (EFAD), in the course of 2016.