Oncology Providers’ Opinions on Neutropenic Diet and Safe Food Handling: A Descriptive Qualitative Study

摘要

© 2022, International Association for Food Protection.Traditionally, cancer patients are prescribed a neutropenic diet to reduce the risk of infection. The diet is restrictive and leads to the patients being dissatisfied. There has been a trend to replace a neutropenic diet with safe food handling, which allows patients to have more food options and places emphasis on how food should be safely handled. Semistructured interviews were conducted with nine oncology providers to understand their opinions on a neutropenic diet, prescription behavior, patient dietary education, and attitudes on the safe food handling approach. Results showed that seven of the nine providers agreed with the neutropenic diet, while two disagreed. Five providers prescribed the neutropenic diet on the basis of different criteria. Patients’ dietary education varied in content and format among providers. Only two of nine providers were aware of a safe food handling approach. Six of nine providers supported the replacement of a neutropenic diet to a safe food handling approach after background information was provided, with one against the replacement, and two supported a combination. These results demonstrated the inconsistency of the neutropenic diet implementation and patient dietary education at the provider level, which could inform changes in how neutropenic diets are handled in a healthcare setting.