The Role of the Dietitian in Perioperative Screening and Care

Publication Date: 13 June 2018

Presenter(s): Paul Wischmeyer, MD, Kathryn Starr, PhD, RD

Location: Durham, NC, USA

Screening for malnutrition and preparing patients for the stress of surgery is a team effort for any health system. Duke School of Medicine dietitian Kathryn Starr, PhD, RD, joins Paul Wischmeyer, MD, in this episode to share how she approaches assessment and treatment, as well as her hope that registered dietitians will become a more common component of patient care teams.

Presenter Bio(s):

Paul Wischmeyer, MD, EDIC, FASPEN, FCCM

Professor of Anesthesiology
Associate Vice Chair for Clinical Research
Department of Anesthesiology
Critical Care Medicine Division
Duke University, Durham, NC

Dr. Wischmeyer is a critical care, perioperative, and nutrition physician-researcher who specializes in enhancing preparation and recovery from surgery and critical care. He serves as a Tenured Professor of Anesthesiology and Surgery at Duke University. He also serves as the Associate Vice Chair for Clinical Research in the Dept. of Anesthesiology and as the Director of the TPN/Nutrition Team at Duke.

For his research work and clinical work, Dr. Wischmeyer has received numerous awards from national and international societies including The John M. Kinney Award for the most significant contribution to the field of general nutrition, the Stanley Dudrick Research Scholar Award by the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition and The Lifetime Achievement Award of the International Parenteral Nutrition Society (IPENEMA) for significant contributions to the field of nutrition.

He has over 200 publications (H index-63 and 46 papers with > 100 citations) in nutrition, critical care, and perioperative care, including publications in the New England Journal of Medicine. He has been an invited speaker at numerous national/international medical meetings, delivering over 1000 invited presentations in his career.

Dr. Wischmeyer’s passion for helping patients recover from illness and surgery arises from his personal experiences as both doctor and patient in the ICU. Thus, preparation for surgery/critical care and recovery from illness are a way of life for Dr. Wischmeyer that he is passionate about teaching his patients and other caregivers worldwide.

Kathryn Porter Starr, PhD, MS, RD

Assistant Professor
Division of Geriatrics, Dept of Medicine
Duke University School of Medicine
Research Health Scientist, Geriatric, Research, Education, and Clinical Center
Durham VA Medical Center
Durham, NC, USA

Dr Starr is an Associate Professor in the Division of Geriatrics in the Department of Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine and Research Health Scientist at the Durham Veteran Affairs Medical Center. Dr. Starr is Director of the Center for Aging Clinical Nutrition Laboratory, and her research and professional experience have focused on nutrition and exercise interventions for community-dwelling older adults at high risk for chronic health conditions and functional decline. Currently, Dr. Starr is PI and Co-PI for clinical research trials involving nutrition optimization and physical activity in vulnerable populations, and PI for a VA Merit award assessing the impact of perioperative nutrition in older Veterans with cancer participating in the VA Perioperative Optimization of Senior Health Program. Finally, she serves as an American College of Surgeons’ Geriatric Surgery Verification Committee Member and has been featured in the New York Times and NPR.

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