RD Makeover- Breaking Away From Traditional Dietetic Roles

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This article discusses the some of the different career paths for registered dietitians.  The article brought up the title Regulatory Performance Director, RD as one of the newer career paths at the time of this publication, which deals the hospital compliance with the Joint Commission.  April Rudat explains   that registered dietitian Kessey Kieselhorst was a clinical nutrition manager who became the Director of regulatory performance at a medical center in Pennsylvania.  Kieselhorst made many moves to get this position including the vice president of the department and went through a total of 16 interviews before getting the job offer.  Only registered nurses had this position in the past and she met every qualification for the position with the exception of a nursing degree.  She is now responsible for three hospitals, 40 community practice sites, two ambulatory surgery centers, and one drug/alcohol facility.

 It took a lot of guts for Kieselhorst to even apply for that job.  It seems there is often conflict between registered nurse and registered dietitian’s roles in the workplace.  This article does a great job showing that with the right experience, leadership ability, and determination, dietitians can move up past clinical nutrition managers and are qualified in some aspects of job performance as nurses.  I would have liked to see if there was a difference in the amount of interviews a RN typically went through for this position compared to Kieselhorst.  Nonetheless, her success will hopefully spark the awareness that dietitians can work in high managerial roles; it just takes a little persistence. 
-DG

Rudat, A.  (2018). "RD Makeover- Breaking Away From Traditional Dietetic Roles." Todays Dietitian 10(5):50. Retrieved from http://www.todaysdietitian.com/.

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