Ashlee Roffe is the Nutrition Director at Swedish Hospital Part of NorthShore in Chicago, Illinois. Her work focuses on creating a culture of nutrition awareness across all areas of clinical practice, and she is passionate about implementing programs that intertwine to support patients throughout their healthcare journey. At Swedish, she manages the Clinical Nutrition team, the Nutrition and Diabetes Center, and founded Food Connections, the hospital’s initiative to address food insecurity in its community. She holds an MS in Nutrition from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a BS in Health Sciences from Bradley University.
The Registered Dietitian uses many tools to guide their nutrition support therapy in the hospital, including current guidelines and malnutrition status. Current literature is increasingly identifying the need to individualize nutrition support to consider the ever-changing metabolic demands of the critically ill population, starting during the acute ICU stay and continuing through the recovery and rehabilitation periods. Indirect Calorimetry is the gold standard for the optimization of energy provision and should be implemented into clinical practice. Optimal protein delivery is important for minimizing loss of lean body mass during acute illness, and is critical to provide amino acids for recovery. The delivery of targeted, individualized nutrition support is a primary pathway towards empowering and elevating nutrition care in all settings.
Learning Objectives:
·Explain what it means to individualize nutrition support therapy
·Outline the clinical evidence and practical solutions supporting implementation of indirect calorimetry
·Describe the importance of protein in critical illness and recovery
·Recognize the importance of the Registered Dietitian as the key source for all nutrition support related issues