title: Health nutrition practice in Italy.
abstract: The increasing need for nutrition professionals is driven by growing public interest in nutrition and the potential of nutrition to prevent and treat a variety of diet-related conditions. Health promotion units and health services face great challenges in trying to address current and future population health issues. This review describes the present state of health nutrition practice in Italy, exploring the nature, role, and utility of training for nutrition professionals to meet the increasing burden of nutrition-related diseases. Evidence suggests that the public health nutrition workforce and infrastructures lack the necessary capacity to respond to national population needs regarding food and nutrition at many levels. This situation is aggravated by the growing prevalence of nutrition-related diseases as well as by the lack of adequate academic nutrition training. The public health nutrition infrastructures need to be enhanced, as do the education and training systems. Roles and functions in health nutrition practice need to be defined and discipline-specific competencies should be integrated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Health Sciences, Section of Human Nutrition and Dietetics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Pavia, Italy. hcena@unipv.it
authors.forename: Hellas
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Cena
authors.forename: Carla
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Roggi
authors.forename: Lucio
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Lucchin
authors.forename: Giovanna
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Turconi
mesh_terms: D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D018673:Nutrition Policy; D044623:Nutrition Therapy; D052756:Nutritional Sciences / Q000193:education*; D011634:Public Health