Our Children’s Nutrition & Dietetics service is made up of two teams, each working to support local families with good nutrition.
Children’s Nutrition Team
We are a team of Nutrition Advisors and Senior Nutrition Advisors who offer healthy lifestyle courses, cooking support, training for professionals and foster carers and award schemes for settings such as schools, children’s homes and nurseries.
Children’s Dietitians Team
We are a team consisting of Paediatric Dietitians, a Nutritionist, an Assistant Practitioner, and a Dietetic Assistant. Our role is to support children to get the nutrition and hydration that they need to grow and develop well. This may be through eating and drinking, but in some cases, it may be through other means such as tube feeding.
We work with children with a variety of medical and dietary requirements such as diabetes, coeliac disease, home tube feeding, faltering growth, weight management and fussy/selective eating.
We may support you through the resources on this microsite, by telephone, at a virtual appointment, a group education session or face to face. We work at local clinics and in some schools. We also provide an in-reach service to the children’s ward and neonatal unit.
This is a healthy lifestyle course for families with children aged 4-16 years who are above a healthy weight and meet one of the following criteria:
live in Tameside
have a Tameside GP
attend a school in Tameside
The course runs over 10 weeks, with follow-up at 6 months and 1 year.
The first week is a face-to-face appointment to introduce the course and understand what you would like to change during the course. Don’t worry if you aren’t sure, our Nutrition Advisors are experienced at helping families to think about this.
During weeks 2-9, you will receive an email with a recorded session about nutrition and a recorded activity session, which you are asked to watch as a family. You will receive a phone call at an arranged time with the Nutrition Advisor to chat about the sessions you have watched and to discuss how you are getting on with the changes you are making. This call is to help you and gives you an opportunity to ask any questions or chat about anything that may be making it hard to progress.
The week 10 session is a face-to-face appointment, with an opportunity to reflect on how you feel the course has gone for you as a family and what changes you have achieved.
You will then be offered extra follow-up appointments at week 26 (6 months) and week 52 (1 year) to support you in keeping going with your changes.
Parents and carers can complete a self-referral form on behalf of their child. Professionals can also refer using the Nutrition & Dietetics referral form.
You may find it helpful to look at this information before making a referral:
My child is now eating new foods and taking part in new activities!
We now look more carefully at what we are eating as a Family!
My Son now has awareness of making healthy choices!
Families have told us that they have made these changes thanks to attending JUMPS4Life:
Eating at the table as a family more
Portion sizes, made healthier choices by reading food labels more
Trying to eat together more
Less snacks, more healthy eating
Our dietitians work closely with the Children’s Nutrition Team and families are encouraged to complete the JUMPS4Life programme for children aged 4-16 years old. We know that it can be hard to live healthy lifestyles and JUMPS4Life offers excellent support to families in developing these.
The children's dietitian service can provide additional assessment and support where:
Body Mass Index (BMI) is on or over 99.6th centile with no co-morbidities
Body Mass Index (BMI) is on or over 98th centile with co-morbidities
Co-morbidities include: Insulin resistance, Type 2 diabetes, exacerbation of asthma, epilepsy, sleep apnoea, high cholesterol and fatty liver
This will be in the form of individual appointments with a nutritionist or dietetic assistant.
Where BMI is below the 98th centile (or below 99.6th centile with no co-morbidities), the family will be offered JUMPS4Life.
Schools can arrange for our Nutrition Advisors to run a Cook4Life course for some of their children and families. This course runs free of charge.
Over a number of weeks, the Nutrition Advisors will provide food and recipes for children to take home and cook with their parents or carers as well as support the family with phone calls along the way.
This can help to get families to try new foods or to cook together. Contact us to find out more.
We run several awards schemes across Tameside.
Food4Life – schools
Available to all schools, including special and alternative education
Food4Life – Cared for children
Available to all Cared for Children providers, including children’s homes and foster carers
Nutrition & oral health award for carers of the under 5s
Available to all nurseries, pre-schools, childminders and parent & toddler groups
Please note that our award schemes are only available to providers within the Tameside area
Our knowledgeable and supportive Nutrition Advisors can work with your setting to help you achieve the criteria for the awards. Contact us to find out more.
Eating well is vital for development, good health and learning. In today’s society we get lots of conflicting messages about what is healthy which can be very confusing.
Our evidence based training courses aim to support staff and volunteers working with Tameside families to provide clear and consistent messages around food and healthy eating. We want to work together to support healthier Tameside families.
To book a place on our free training, or for further information, contact us. Our Nutrition Advisors can also provide bespoke training sessions. Please contact us to discuss your requirements.
Cook4Life Train the Trainer
Suitable for any staff or volunteers working with children, young people and families who are looking to run a cooking club. Training is run over 3 weekly sessions by the Children’s Nutrition Team.
Topics covered include:
How to run a cooking course for children, young people and families.
How to be an effective cooking skills trainer
Promoting Healthy Eating and Lifestyles in your setting
Basics of food hygiene and kitchen safety
Interpretation of Food Labels
Recipe planning
Cooking simple recipes
Healthy Eating on a low income
Introduction to Nutrition
This course is suitable for anyone wanting to learn more about healthy nutrition, promote basic healthy eating messages and discover current guidance.
Topics covered include:
The model for healthy eating
Fats, salt and sugar – implications and healthier alternatives
Food Labels – how to decipher the information
Advice to support healthier families
This course is ideal for teachers, teaching support teams, health professionals, community workers and family intervention teams.
Nutrition & Oral Health Update for carers of the under 5s
Suitable for all early years workers who live or work in Tameside.
Topics covered include:
Nutrition advice for young children
Oral health advice
The impact nutritional health has for children within the childcare setting
Food & Nutrition for Foster Carers
Training and support session for foster carers within Tameside.
This session is suitable for any foster carers wanting to learn more about healthy nutrition, promote basic healthy eating messages and discover current guidance.
Topics covered include:
The model for healthy eating
Fats, salt and sugar – implications and healthier alternatives
Food Labels – how to decipher the information and make healthier choices
Who can refer?
The Children’s Nutrition Team accept referrals from parents and carers, health professionals, social care and education.
The Children’s Dietitians Team accept referrals from health professionals such as Health Visitors, School Nurses, GPs and Paediatricians.
