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VII. What Food? (DIET ERRORS)

Florence Nightingale, 1860
🧠 MNEMONIC: DIET FACTS

Diet errors are common
Iron-rich foods: beef tea not as nourishing as thought
Egg equivalent to meat? FALSE
Think vegetables necessary, not just meat

Flour better than arrowroot
Always use fresh milk, never sour
Cream is irreplaceable in chronic disease
Taste matters — patients dislike sweets
Scorbutic patients crave sweets (exception)

VII. What Food?

📌 COMMON ERRORS IN DIET (MEMORIZE THESE)

🥩 BEEF TEA

Error: Believed most nutritive of all articles
Truth: Barely a teaspoonful of solid nourishment to half pint of water. But has reparative quality — can be given in inflammatory disease.

🥚 EGGS

Error: Egg equivalent to lb of meat
Truth: Not at all so. Many patients (nervous/bilious) eggs disagree. Egg whipped with wine often only form they can take.

🥕 MEAT WITHOUT VEGETABLES

Error: Giving meat is all that's needed
Truth: Scorbutic sores appear when nurse allows patient without vegetables — badly cooked so patient leaves them.

🍚 ARROWROOT

Error: Grand dependence of nurse
Truth: Nothing but starch and water. Flour more nutritive, less liable to ferment.

🥛 MILK, BUTTER, CREAM

  • Butter: Lightest animal fat — valuable for enabling more bread
  • Cream: Irreplaceable in chronic diseases — easier digestion than milk
  • Fresh milk: Slight sourness causes diarrhoea — nurse must exercise utmost care
  • Buttermilk: Totally different — often useful in fevers

🍬 SWEET THINGS

Fact: Sugar is pure carbon, most nutritive. BUT vast majority of patients dislike sweet things. Furred tongue almost always likes what is sharp or pungent.

Exception: Scorbutic patients often crave sweetmeats and jams.

🍮 JELLY

Error: In favor with nurses and friends
Truth: 1/8 oz gelatine dissolved in water — no nourishment. Has tendency to produce diarrhoea. Starving the sick under guise of feeding them.

💡 Memory Tip: The "BEAST" of diet errors:
  • Beef tea overvalued
  • Egg myth (equal to meat)
  • Arrowroot useless
  • Sweets disliked by most
  • Trust cream, not jelly

📝 Key Takeaways for NCLEX

  • Beef tea is NOT highly nutritive - barely 1 tsp nourishment per pint
  • Jelly has NO nourishment - it's starving the sick
  • Cream is irreplaceable in chronic disease

🧠 Mnemonic Summary

  • NURSE: Nature heals, Universal skill, Reflective practice, Sanitary knowledge, Everyday application

Source: Notes on Nursing: What It Is and What It Is Not, Florence Nightingale, 1860. First American Edition.