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Beyond Fussy Eating programme launched to help children with eating challenges

A new online programme has been launched by experts at Your Healthcare, to support children who restrict their food intake to a very small range of familiar foods. Beyond Fussy Eating has been developed for parents, carers and professionals.

Refusing known and new foods is a normal stage of a child’s development, often starting between 18 and 30 months of age and with most children growing out of it by 5 years-old.

But for some children, feeding becomes a persistent and serious problem which, if ignored, can lead to serious weight loss and nutritional deficiencies. These problems can include eating a very restrictive diet made up of a small number of foods, only eating foods which are a certain colour – for example ‘beige foods’ like cheese and pasta, chicken nuggets, chips and white bread – or food with a certain texture, or eating very small volumes of foods. It can also involve becoming highly anxious when asked to try new foods, and showing disgust or fear when presented with new foods.

Research shows that children on the autistic spectrum and those with developmental disabilities are much more likely to experience these problems. But help is at hand! There are tried and tested methods which can help children start to make steps in the right direction and these are presented in a new Beyond Fussy Eating programme, designed for parents and carers dealing with children who are extremely selective eaters and/or who may have little interest in food and eating. The programme will also help health, education and care staff who work with these children. Link to programme.

Beyond Fussy Eating consists of five modules covering: exploring feeding difficulties; mealtime strategies; learning about new foods; planning for changes; and a parent’s perspective (video). It was developed by children’s speech and language therapists at Your Healthcare CIC, whose expertise covers speech, language, communication and swallowing problems.

Commenting, Fraiza Sword, Highly Specialist Speech and Language Therapist, said: “Having a child who eats a really limited range of foods, or doesn’t seem interested in eating much at all, can be highly stressful for parents and carers. But there are ways of introducing new foods to young children which can be successful. It’s certainly not an overnight cure, and takes time and patience, but by starting with our new Beyond Fussy Eating course, parents and carers will have the opportunity to make steps forward with their child’s eating challenges.”