Infuse Infuse 9 September 2019 | Page 4

From the Desk
of Maree Ferguson
Founder & Director, Dietitian Connection
I’m calling for a name change! Dietitian – diet – die: it’s
hardly the best name for a profession wanting to promote
health and wellness. We’ve all been at a party when
somebody asks what you do; before you proudly announce
you’re a dietitian and brace yourself for the response
that follows.
When the word dietitian is mentioned
most people immediately think “food
police” and fear we’ll judge them on what
they eat. Someone once said to me “they
thought going to see a dietitian would feel
like a punishment for something they’d
done wrong”. A thought that saddened me
– for if only people could see the typical
dietitian, is seldom judgemental, highly
empathetic and truly just wants to help.
Aside from those dietitians working in
the media, who mostly use “nutritionist”,
or those in research using “doctor” or
“scientist” somewhere in their title, the
name dietitian continues to define
the profession!
© Dietitian Connection
If we want to be the “go to” people for
nutrition advice, I now believe more than
ever, our name is holding us back. As a
profession, we’ve come a long way in the
last few decades from the concepts of
dieting, and for some reason our name
hasn’t kept up with our current thinking of
non-dieting and HAES.
I acknowledge, changing the name of an
entire profession globally, will be no easy
feat. For starters, what do we change our
name to? I actually first raised this topic
in June 2016 on the Dietitian Connection
Facebook page and it created quite a stir,
with many people thinking we shouldn’t
change our name at all. Other suggestions
included:
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Infuse | September 2019