Dawn Pittman

Nutrition is a determinant in numerous aspects of health and wellbeing. Nurse educator Dawn Pittman of Western Regional School of Nursing (WRSON) is exploring how we can help improve nutrition among older adults in western Newfoundland and throughout the province.

"I'm hoping this work will help to understand and address the health challenges that are facing a population that is aging and often geographically isolated," said Ms. Pittman, who is conducting this research as part of her PhD Studies at Memorial University's School of Nursing with supervisor Dr. Karen Parsons.

Her research is also an exploration into an emerging field of study in nursing: environmental health.

"I wanted to do something more proactive, more preventative," explained Ms. Pittman. "I started looking at environmental health – that's what I was really interested in – and it's a fairly new area, especially within nursing. I'm looking at that plus nutrition in older adults."

Environmental health considers the way in which a person's built and natural surroundings affect their health. These surroundings could include the infrastructure available to the person, including transport routes like highways, or factors such as the climate of the area where they live. These combine with aging, and other social influences, to make nutrition in older adults a complex topic of study.

Pictured here are Nurse educator Dawn Pittman and her supervisor, Dr. Karen Parsons. Submitted photo.

"As you age you might have arthritis in your hands, you might not be able to chop up vegetables anymore, or you might not have a car so you can't go to the grocery store," said Ms. Pittman. "Also there are big environmental factors that impact what we eat such as our climate, transportation systems, even our social environment. As you age and your children leave the home you may not want to be cooking for yourself anymore. There are a lot of things that affect what we eat. I'm trying to map those specifically to western Newfoundland."

Ms. Pittman is working with four community partners, Western Health, Grenfell Campus, Western Environment Centre and Bonne Bay Cottage Hospital Heritage Corp., as well as patient partners, to carry out this research. Interviews with older adults will be conducted with those aged forty-five plus.

"The reason is that a forty-five-year-old today will be a sixty-five-year-old in 20 years, so we need to know what affects both age groups today to find out what will affect them tomorrow," she said.

Nurses represent a large group of professionals who often work in rural areas in western Newfoundland and throughout the province, so they have a chance to make a big impact on access to nutrition. Institutions such as the Aging Research Centre-NL also have a role to play. Research outputs will include a toolkit and action plan with suggestions for interventions encompassing both policy and nursing practise.