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Please Note:Class for July 30 has been cancelled. Next class in Davis will be held on August 14th. |
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No Poll this week, please visit the poll from last week's issue to share your thoughts. We appreciate your input. |
| News |
QCHF Clinical/Educational Series -
Dietary/Nutrition - Avoiding Survey Checkmate  (4 CEUs)
HMC senior staff are the featured speakers at the next QCHF workshop. Please encourage facility staff to attend --- CEs for administrators, nursing, and dietary supervisors.
A Dietary and Nutrition Workshop
�Hear the very latest in culture change
�Make sure you are compliant with Title 22 food service requirements
�Role play the survey process with authorities in their field
�F-Tag 371 is the #1 sited F-Tag across the country for the last 29 years - A large number of Immediate Jeopardies in California are dietary related.
This is no longer just the dietitian's problem...it needs to be part of the critical thinking process for everyone in your facility.
August 11 - Crowne Plaza Anaheim/Garden Grove
August 12 - Four Points Sheraton, Pleasanton
August 13 - Radisson Fresno
Click here for more information and to register | |
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Greetings!
It's August! Thank you for reading your issue of RDNews. |
| RD News |
Hot August Days
August has started gently this year with mild days, instead of scorching heat. The weatherman says in Sacramento we have had 13 days this year where the mercury hit 100+ with the highest  temperature at 108. Boy that is hot! Do you notice how hot it is in the kitchen? Of course, you've heard the saying, "If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen!" But, how does the dietary staff stay cool in the summer? How do we expect them to prepare meals, wash dishes, put away stock and clean the kitchen when it is sweltering?
Perhaps you have heard the news stories of employers, such as farm workers, who were arrested when their employees collapse of heat exhaustion? Today it is the law in California: employers are mandated to reduce employee heat risks. Heat related injuries and illnesses strike US worksites each year, resulting in approximately 27 deaths a year. Cal/OSHA now requires companies to provide access to clean, cool drinking water, as well as written instructions for recognizing and treating heat illness.
Most dietary departments in California are not air conditioned. The cooking equipment itself produces so much heat that it generally will overwhelm the typical air conditioning system. The key to maintaining tolerable work conditions is in moving the air. The rule that architects or engineers use is three air exchanges per minute. The volume of air in the room must be replaced by exhaust hoods, swamp coolers, air conditioning or fans three times per minute to keep the dietary department comfortable. Some facilities rent industrial size fans or portable swamp coolers during a heat wave. This may even save money by preventing the super heated air in the dietary department to filter into the resident halls. Using a fan will lower room temperatures 4-5degrees (a great way to save on air conditioning at home, too.) As the consultant dietitian watch for placement of the fan that it does not contaminate prepared food, inadvertently reduce hot food temperatures or create a tripping hazard for the dietary staff. |
| RD Tip |
Here are some other ideas to maintain the cool:
- Allow dietary staff access to water while working, but it must be in an enclosed container with a straw to avoid cross-contamination. See HMC P&P pages 39-40.
- Assist the DSS to make simple changes to the menu to reduce oven usage such as changing a baked dessert to boxed cookies or fruit
- Check temperature of beverages, especially milk. Expect that liquids will gain one degree per minute once placed at room temperature. Assist dietary to change procedures to ensure cold foods are served below 45 degrees and frozen
 ice cream or gelatins are not melted. Ideas and best practices for cold food are located in the HMC P&P 341-342.
- Do not prop doors from dietary to hallways open. This is not effective and violates fire safety laws.
- Be an advocate for the dietary staff to Administration. As the food service expert suggest no or low cost ways to make the dietary workers more comfortable.
- Volunteer to conduct an In-service for the dietary staff on the signs of heat exhaustion. Ask the DSD and Administrator to participate. As their consultant, be diplomatic as this issue may be a "hot potato" for the facility management and your purpose is not to create unhappy dietary workers. The focus should be hydration while avoiding cross-contamination.
- Suggest that facility consider a long range plan for cooling improvements. Unfortunately, as soon as the heat wave is gone, this need becomes forgotten until the next summer.
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| Dear Dietitians; |
Twenty years ago I was consulting in a Sonoma county facility and the heat actually became my problem. The morning cook in this large SNF was a petite 25 year old mother who collapsed of heat stroke in the kitchen. She was removing a pan of baked chicken at that moment which ended upon the floor with her. Paramedics were called and they raced her to the hospital. During the fall, she hit her head on the tray line causing a concussion. Plus she burned her arms, face and other areas with the hot pan and grease. This was a worker's comp on-the-job injury. She was in the hospital overnight and missed a month of work.
When they paged me to the kitchen, I immediately stepped in to help the staff prepare a substitute meal for  the residents and serve tray line. But, what I did afterwards is really more important. Researching kitchen design and heat became a passion. Let's be advocates for a safe working environment.
Keep cool and thank you for your work --- you make a difference for dietary workers, too! Lee
Lee Tincher, MS, RD
President
HM Composite, Inc. | |
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Registered Dietitian Newsletter
