Most medical students overconfident, underprepared on nutrition guidelines

NEWS

Ohio University researchers found medical students may be more confident than knowledgeable when it comes to nutrition. Of the 257 medical students studied, more than 55 percent were confident they could counsel patients on nutritional recommendations, but half did not achieve a passing score on a nutrition quiz, according to a study published in The Journal of the American Osteopathic Association.

COMMENT

If one examines just how little nutritional training is actually given in most medical schools today, the poor nutrition knowledge of the doctors who emerge from them is not in the least surprising.

An academic survey published in 2010 found that medical students in the United States receive an average of only 19.6 hours of nutritional education throughout four years of training. This effectively corresponds to less than 1 percent of their total estimated lecture hours. Even more worryingly, of the 109 medical schools that took part in this academic survey, four offered only optional nutritional instruction; one reported it did not offer any such tuition; and the respondent for one apparently couldn’t supply an answer to the question.

With doctors knowing so little about nutrition, it’s hardly surprising that hospital food has such a poor reputation!