President's Message
Dr Trevor Smith, BAPEN President
I hope everyone has been enjoying summer festivities alongside friends and family – it’s hard to believe that autumn is already fast approaching. It is my pleasure to share a whistle-stop tour of BAPEN’s various activities over the past few months, as well as to highlight a couple of current and upcoming plans that I hope many of you will be interested in.
Dietitians Week 2023
I was once again impressed by the events and overall excitement during Dietitians Week in June. I enjoyed seeing the many ‘Faces of Dietetics’ from across the UK, showcasing the array of expertise within the specialty. If you missed it, here is a nice wrap-up video of those who took part.
The ever-popular Dietetic Bake Off was another opportunity to share information, demonstrate creative flair, and be rewarded with a tasty treat! Congratulations to the deserving winner, Francielle Perez.
Ultimately the week was a terrific chance to celebrate the work of dietitians and I’m proud to work alongside such talented professionals.
Home Artificial Nutrition (HAN) Week 2023
It has been a pleasure to support HAN Week 2023, organised by PINNT. The annual awareness campaign strives to increase understanding about essential nutritional treatments, spanning parenteral nutrition, enteral nutrition, and oral supplements.
Raising awareness about these lifesaving treatments, received by people in the community, is an important mission which PINNT has grasped with both hands.
I’m pleased to share that BAPEN has worked closely with PINNT and our other Core Groups to develop a resource which supports patients and carers around what nutritional care they can expect. This Quality Standards resource for patients will be published at the end of HAN Week and we hope will be of great use to people feeling confident about the care they can expect.
Congratulations to all those who have organised and contributed to the success of HAN Week – let’s keep up the momentum into the final day!
UK Malnutrition Awareness Week 2023
I hope you’re ready for another exciting awareness week coming very soon - UKMAW 2023! Returning between 6-12 November, we’re aiming for this year’s campaign to be the best yet!
BAPEN is working alongside the Malnutrition Task Force (MTF) for the sixth year running. It is so important that malnutrition and dehydration are recognised as everyone’s business, so please do get involved, spread the message to your Multidisciplinary Teams (MDTs), and help us raise awareness.
More information will be shared on the focus and activities of UKMAW 2023, and as always, the best way to stay up to date is by following BAPEN’s social media accounts and via the website.
BAPEN Conference 2023
I’m sure you have all marked your diaries for 28 – 29 November to attend the BAPEN Conference 2023. This year, we’re packing our bags for Edinburgh to experience a diverse programme of broad topics, brought together by our outstanding programme planning committee of experts.
Thank you to all those who submitted abstracts. The submissions are a wonderful celebration of the brilliant work being done across the nutrition landscape and a definite sign of optimism about future progress.
I hope to see as many of you there as possible. If you haven’t registered yet, please do so by visiting the website. Here you can access the programme, speaker information, venue information, and more!
BAPEN Instagram
I’ve already mentioned that following BAPEN’s social media channels is a great way to stay up to date with updates from BAPEN and our Core Groups. With this in mind, I’m delighted to share that this summer BAPEN joined Instagram. We are always striving to increase our ability to share information and drive meaningful change, and this platform helps us to do exactly that.
We’re pleased to see that many of you have already started following BAPEN on Instagram, but if you haven’t already, please visit our page here.
Best wishes,
Trevor
Return to top