Should we stop weighing kids at school?

Welcome to the MHD newsletter. Your short educational read to have with your Friday morning coffee.

Weekly check in:

The Olympics is well underway! As you read this I will be in France about to go to watch some of the football games. Watching the games always makes me inspired to try some different sports, what about you?

This week’s edition officially marks two months of the MHD newsletter! It has become a fun part of my week putting it all together and hearing your feedback.

Journal prompt: 

What does it mean to you, to have a relationship with food? 

We hear this term a lot, so it is helpful to consider what it means to you, what you think of when you hear the term.

There’s a thought provoking American dietitian that I follow on Instagram called Shyla Cadogan. Shyla suggests that having a good relationship with food means having no relationship with food. This has really got me thinking, and for me I disagree, I don’t think we can escape having a relationship to something so central to life, health, culture and celebration. What do you think?

Nutrition in the news: The unintended consequences of school-based health and nutrition policies

How do you rate your school nutrition education? 

Did you ever get weighed in school? 

As an eating disorder dietitian I have heard from many clients who cite early uncomfortable experiences in school as triggering factors in the development of their eating disorders. In particular I have heard a lot of negative experiences of the UK’s national child measurement programme. I myself remember being weighed in front of the whole class as part of this programme.

The article linked above is a recently published review looking at the evidence of unintended consequences of similar school health programmes in the US. 

The review found that monitoring the BMI of children at school led to a wide range of unintended negative consequences.

While the programme itself wasn’t found to have a positive impact on weight or health.

The study authors recommendation was: “Considering the risk vs. benefit, we recommend de-implementation of BMI screening and surveillance in school settings.”

There is increasing drive from parents and professionals to scrap the UK’s national child measurement programme. With psychology lecturer Dr Sarah Gillborn stating that “While there is no evidence to suggest the NCMP has any positive influence, plenty of evidence shows the harm it may cause.”

For me personally, if I had kids in school I would voluntarily opt them out of the programme.

New book of the month for August:

I hope you read The Wisdom of your Body with us, and I hope you loved it. It was a joy to read and something that we will be coming back to for sure.

Our next read is a very recently published book by my dietitian colleague and microbiome researcher Dr Emily Leeming. Can’t wait to learn from her teachings on the gut-brain connection.

Clinic update: 

We launched Mental Health Dietitians at the start of June this year, to bring together the range of specialisms within mental health dietetics.

We provide 1-1 consultations, and are currently working on webinars to go more in depth on the topics we talk about here and on social media. We will let you know once the dates have been finalised, and of course you will be invited. Please let us know if there are any topics in our field that you would like a webinar on.

That’s all from us this week, back again same time next week.

Look after yourself <3

Sophie and the team at Mental Health Dietitians.

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