Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Hi there,
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest

any dieticians here?

  • 26-12-2010 3:37pm
    #1
    hatethisfeeling
    Closed Accounts Posts: 185 ✭✭


    I already posted this in the health science education forum but was told I would get more of a response here. Just wondering if there are any dieticians here who could give me an overview as to what the jon entails, salary and if you would pick it again if you were starting all over...any info would be apprciated!


Comments

  • #2
    Sapsorrow
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,057 ✭✭✭Sapsorrow


    I'm not a dietician but I know it's a really really bad time job wise for dieticians, there are far too many as it is and with the HSE freeze there's not gonna be any new positions coming up any time soon. If you were willing to go abroad then you'd probably find work, especially in the US. It's insanely competitive and hard to get into the courses here and in the UK though. There's lots of very ambitious and experienced dieticians unemployed at the moment who you as a grad would have to compete with. I did Nutritional Science and out of maybe 25-30 applicants only 4 got in anywhere (they would have applied to any colleges offering it here and in the UK), and that was considered a good year for admissions. There was a very high standard in my class too, most people applying would have had at least a 2.1 honours and usually a 1.1 ad would have had to perform well in all the interviews etc. The money isn't as good here as you might think as far as I know and the hours are pretty gruelling. I'm only going on what a handful of dieticians told me/us in college and our day following some around that we did in Cork University Hospital, so maybe someone else here can offer more insight. As far as I could tell the job mainly involved writing up menus, IV solutions and having very brief sessions of only 10-20 minutes per patient before they are checked out. You also specialise in one area, ie. renal, cancer etc.. and are expected to follow a protocol of treatment. There's no room for using your own approach to treatment if you work in a clinical setting. If you were to work as a private consultant or as practitioner of a health clinic it would probably be harder to earn a living but you would have more flexibility in treatments and probably be able to become more involved with patients. I got the impression that the hospital consultations were horribly brief and impersonal. It turned me off any notions of doing a post-grad in it anyway. You could try emailing the dietetics and nutrition dept in UCD or Colerain and see about maybe having a chat with one of the course coordinators/lecturers to see if it's what you're looking for? I did that before I went to UCC and the staff were so helpful and nice.


Advertisement