Our food should be our medicine and our medicine should be our food. A group of third-year dietetic students from the North-West University (NWU) proved this statement true when they participated in the Dietitians Week initiative.

This year’s initiative, aimed at creating awareness around the dietetics profession and the services they provide, was driven by the Association for Dietetics South Africa (ADSA), South African Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (SASPEN), Enteral Nutrition Association of South Africa (ENASA) and the Hospital Dietitian’s Interest Group.

Dietitians’ week took place from 4t- 8 June 2018 and this year’s theme was “Dietitians do prevention”.

Dietetic students from universities across South Africa were asked to participate by sharing recipes, videos or info-graphs focusing on disease prevention, especially preventing malnutrition among the elderly.

3rd year dietetic students for the NWU also took part in a competition and two groups of dietetic students walked away with the spoils.

“We are extremely proud of our students,”, says Mariaan Wicks, senior lecturer at the Centre of Excellence for Nutrition. “This is an excellent initiative that brings awareness to our profession and our students’ achievements.”

Students’ recipes were combined in a book which are distributed by ADSA and SASPEN. The recipe collection can also be viewed as an e-book , or can be downloaded as a PDF document .