Ethnic Food Choices, Healing and Healthcare

Increasingly, patients and family members are insisting on the inclusion of ethnic food varieties in healthcare menus.  In the countless discussions I have had with family members and patients around this topic, the importance of ethnic food availability has continuously been given emphasis to in a way that suggests that these requests are greater than basic food preferences.  This leads me to question the potential of ethnic food as a therapeutic adjunct to care.  It is clear that cultural foods are an extremely important resource for many individuals in acute and long term care facilities.  But just how important is it?  Can it be considered a component of care?  And if so, what are doing about it?

Ethnic Food and Identity

Coming from a culturally diverse home and having experienced an incredible diversity of foods throughout my lifetime, I can appreciate the importance of regular ethnic food consumption.  As my parents both immigrated to Canada from different countries, they brought with them a number of unique cultural recipes.  These were  habitually cooked in the home to feed the family and were filled with so many wild flavours that they made our taste buds dance.  I grew up very connected to our food traditions, and for me, these cultural foods will always be part of who I am.  This leads to my first point.  Food is inextricably connected to identity.  We very much are what we eat.  Many of the ethnic foods I love remind me of good memories in our home and now represent a segment of my own being.  When illness complicates our profiles and leaves us feeling not quite like ourselves, we desperately reach out for anything that can help restore that feeling of normalcy again.  For many of us, it is cultural food that comforts us in our times of need and helps us feel somewhat re-connected to ourselves and to our loved ones.  Ethnic food is a very real part of patients’ identities that should be considered in menu development to improve customer satisfaction and potentially facilitate the healing process.

Ethnic Food and Control

Lack of control is an important consideration in patient care.  For ageing patients who have lost or who are gradually losing control of mind and/or body function, the need for control over food choices and intake often increases.  Ethnic foods are typically requested by patients in these circumstances as many of them complain that traditional healthcare foods taste bland and are not texturally appealing.  They often want foods from home that they are accustomed to eating and enjoying and spare no detail in describing the way these foods smell, taste, and feel as they remember previous food experiences.  Health promotion is not typically a top priority for these residents as some of them are beginning to or already have accepted the possibility of passing.  And so they fight for what they want and refuse what they dislike.  Cultural foods potentially remind them of who they were and maybe even of who they have become.  As their choices in life become limited by their disease states, these patients fight desperately for control over food that means a lot to them.

Ethnic Food and Connectedness

Finally, ethnic food is far more than just food.  It is a cultural and familial piece and often implies processes, emotions and connections.  As cultural foods are typically shared, they involve union and can strengthen bonds between individuals.  It is reasonable then that patients crave and insist on being fed these foods while they are ill as they tend to feel alone during these times and can be starved for the attention of familiar faces.  The flavours, appearances and aromas of cultural foods can hold memories- wonderful memories of previous times shared with important people.  What are the implications of denying patients these precious experiences?

Now What?

Increasingly, ethnic food choices and ingredients are becoming available from trusted food companies that can supply acute and long term care facilities.  Food adventurist populations simultaneously appear to be growing.  Cultural foods are being tried out and liked by varieties of cultures- suggesting a potential place for expanding menus to include more ethnic options for everyone.  With the right nutritional profiles that can be achieved by food development teams informed by registered dietitians, ethnic foods can be offered to patients and meet nutritional care guidelines.  But how long will we wait?  How many voices need to be heard before we begin to make an effort to meet patient needs and feed their souls?