Nutrition Care Process: Elements for its implementation and use by Nutrition and Dietetics Professionals

Abstract

Introduction: The Nutrition Care Process (NCP) and NCP Terminology (NCPT) provides a performance protocol that allows encouraging critical thinking, promoting evidence-based professional practice, documenting it, measuring outcomes and evaluating the quality of nutritional care. Objective: To increase awareness of using NCP and NCPT, its basic elements, application in nutritional care in professionals of Nutrition and Dietetics and evaluating its international implementation. Material and methods: A systematic review of the published works about NCP and NCPT in English and Spanish. Search terms: Nutrition Care Process, Dietetic Care Process, Standardized Terminology, Proceso/Plan de Atención/Cuidado Nutricional/Dietético and TE. It was not limited by date of publication and those articles with low scientific evidence or with changes from the original model were excluded. Results: The NCP provides a holistic approach and contributes to improving the quality of nutritional care, the exchange information and nutritional follow-up. The implementation of the NCP improves the productivity of those professionals, who are using it, and furthermore, promotes and strengthens the functions of the Nutrition professional in clinical-community healthcare settings. Conclusions: NCP and NCPT are internationally recognized tools to promote the professional practice in the clinical-community setting and nutritional research, emphasizing the requirement to include it in the academic curriculum and the professional practice of Nutrition and Dietetics.