Food provision in residential aged care facilities (RACF) is layered, being influenced by multiple stakeholders. Continuous improvement activities are required to build upon existing implementation and find new opportunities to improve nutrition in aged care. Commercial stakeholders can assist availability of nutritious, appropriate food for residents. Food industry nutritionists and dietitians educate businesses and people from non-nutrition backgrounds about nutrition needs.
Bega Group’s product portfolio includes milk, yogurt, cheese, juice and spreads. The Bega Nutrition Team (BNT) of nutritionists and dietitians works towards creating food for a better future by guiding product development, reformulations and nutrition communications. With nutritious products, BNT explores continuous improvement opportunities to support partner RACF with the availability of nutritious, tasty options.
Objective:
To help Bega Group build capacity and capability, with its products and workforce to support delivery of better nutrition for aged care.
Methods:
BNT undertook scoping activities to better understand the aged care nutrition landscape. This included participating in education sessions with a specialised aged care dietetic service, reviewing the findings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, particularly the Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards.
For stakeholder needs analysis, BNT visited RACF and interviewed staff, attended conferences and engaged the Bega Group Health & Aged Care Marketing and Sales teams (BMST).
As the primary point of contact with RACF, BMST has a role in promoting Bega Group foods that support nutrition. BNT brainstormed with BMST to prioritise themes that Bega Group could support, identified opportunities for capacity building, and determined metrics to indicate improvements. It was envisaged that these activities would result in a suite of nutrition-related resources to facilitate conversations between BMST and RACF partners.
Results:
Scoping and needs analysis revealed focus areas for action:
QS6
It was identified that education for BMST would be beneficial. To build capacity, BNT hosted a QS6 workshop and this led to feedback that a written resource for BMST to utilise with partners would be helpful. The resource was developed by BNT to demonstrate various ways that Bega Group products can relate to QS6.
IDDSI
Integrating IDDSI nomenclature into resources was identified as an opportunity to expand product availability and variety to residents with texture requirements. BNT worked with product technologists and a quality specialist to conduct IDDSI audits on products and ensure the integrity of product IDDSI levels assigned at manufacturing to reflect those communicated.
Conclusion:
Next steps are evaluating the scope and utilisation of these activities and tools by interviewing BMST and RACF. Future metrics for consideration include the mode and quantity of nutrition resources, the confidence of BMST in nutrition conversations and the impact on sales of nutritious foods.
This case reframes the collaborative approach to achieving positive nutrition outcomes by demonstrating that continuous improvement can be undertaken by commercial organisations to support nutrition goals.