Staff-perceived barriers to nutrition intervention in substance use disorder treatment

Our results show that staff training, food service changes, the use of targeted curriculum for nutrition groups and the encouragement of discussing self-care in individual counselling sessions can lead to positive shifts about nutrition-related organisational change among staff.

While organisational change in substance use disorder (SUD) treatment has been extensively studied, there is no research describing facility-wide changes related to nutrition interventions. This study evaluates staff-perceived barriers to change before and after a wellness initiative. Design: A pre-intervention questionnaire was administered to participating staff prior to facility-wide changes (n 40). The questions were designed to assess barriers across five domains: (1) provision of nutrition-related treatment; (2) implementation of nutrition education; (3) screening, detecting and monitoring (nutrition behaviours); (4) facility-wide collaboration and (5) menu changes and client satisfaction. A five-point Likert scale was used to indicate the extent to which staff anticipate difficulty or ease in implementing facility-wide nutrition changes, perceived as organisational barriers. Follow-up questionnaires were identical to the pre-test except that it examined barriers experienced, rather than anticipated (n 50). Setting: A multisite SUD treatment centre in Northern California which began implementing nutrition programming changes in order to improve care. Participants: Staff members who consented to participate.

From pre to post, we observed significant decreases in perceived barriers related to the provision of nutrition-related treatment (P = 0·019), facility-wide collaboration (P = 0·036), menu changes and client satisfaction (P = 0·024). Implementation of nutrition education and the domain of screening, detecting and monitoring did not reach statistical significance. Conclusions: Our results show that staff training, food service changes, the use of targeted curriculum for nutrition groups and the encouragement of discussing self-care in individual counselling sessions can lead to positive shifts about nutrition-related organisational change among staff.