President's Message
Dr Trevor Smith, BAPEN President
As summer approaches, I’m sure you’ll agree that the year is flying by – I hope everybody is looking forward to some warm weather. These past few months have been busy for BAPEN, so I am pleased to share some recent highlights, as well as drawing your attention to some upcoming plans that you can all get involved in.
Nutrition and Hydration Week 2023
We were proud to support the annual Nutrition and Hydration Week in March, joining with organisations and individuals to highlight the value of food and drink in maintaining health and wellbeing. Now in its 11th year, it was brilliant to see everyone getting involved with the activities throughout the week.
A particular highlight for me was the Global Tea Party on Wednesday 15th March, as we brought our community together to eat, drink, and connect with one another. Eating together can be an important way to improve emotional wellbeing, diets, and help to support those close to us.
Nutrition and Hydration Week is always a fantastic time to highlight the inspiring work that has been done to drive awareness. Congratulations to those involved in making the campaign a success!
BAPEN Patient Network Development Group
As you know, BAPEN is proudly multidisciplinary, representing different patients and professionals involved in nutritional care. We are therefore excited to be furthering our close relationship with PINNT by co-creating new resources to support our patients and carers with nutritional care. Do keep an eye out for these resources being launched on PINNT and BAPEN’s digital platforms.
Find out more by reading our joint statement of intent.
International Nurses Day (12th May) and NNNG Conference (13-14th June)
Recently, we also marked International Nurses Day. This is an important day for us to come together to praise the vital role of nurses in patient care. For BAPEN, this is particularly true regarding nutritional care – good nutrition needs nurses! I am delighted that BAPEN continues to work closely with the National Nurses Nutrition Group (NNNG) and with this in mind, I am delighted to support the NNNG Conference 2023 which returns next month. This will be a fantastic event that will cover the complex world of nutrition, as well as showcasing the support that is available to access.
You’ll be able to hear from an expert line up of speakers including:
- Kathy Whayman - Chair of the RCN Gastrointestinal Nursing Forum
- Matt Hill - Clinical Advisor at NHSI PSC
- Sean White - Pain Medicine Consultant at London Pain Service.
The Conference is sure to be insightful to all healthcare professionals – to register, please click here.
BAPEN Podcasts
As many of you know, we excitedly launched our new podcast series earlier this year, with the inaugural series dedicated to bringing to life the British Intestinal Failure Alliance’s (BIFA) top tips. Our first episode, hosted by Dr Anne Holdoway, focused on the topic of high output stomas, providing knowledge for all healthcare professionals to apply to in their everyday practice. It has been delightful to read all of your positive feedback and reviews from our first episode.
I am happy to share that our second episode is out now! This episode explores the topic of Refeeding Syndrome, joined by Consultant Gastroenterologist, Dr Aminda de Silva, and Clinical Specialist Dietitian, Peter Turner. Key topics covered in this episode include understanding the risk criteria of refeeding syndrome, as well as necessary steps to management and prevention in practice.
Be sure to listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or via the BAPEN website.
The 2023 BAPEN Conference
We’re really excited to be in full swing planning this year’s BAPEN Conference. The dates for your diary are the 28th and 29th November 2023, and this year it’ll be held at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC). Early bird registration and abstract submission pages will be opening at the end of May, so do check out the website for more details!
We’ve got a number of insightful and hugely topical sessions lined up already; we’ll be hearing from key speakers about dysphagia, jejunal feeding, high output stoma management, metabolic problems in IF, the EFFORT protein trial, screening and malnutrition in the community, the microbiome, when bariatric surgery goes wrong and blended diets, just to name a few.
Keep an eye on our social channels as we start to announce speakers and their sessions over the coming weeks.
Best wishes,
Trevor
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