What We Do
Nutritional Support
Helping the children we serve reach and maintain a healthy weight
Malnutrition Complicates Healing
CURE serves children and families living in some of the world’s most challenging environments, where they experience severe hunger. This means many children arrive at our hospitals suffering from malnutrition.
CURE Provides Nutritional Support So Children Can Thrive
To undergo life-changing surgery and flourish in recovery and beyond, they must receive proper nutrition to reach and maintain a healthy and safe weight. Our solution? Provide three nutrient-dense meals a day to all patients (and their caregivers!).
The result is improved patient health that makes surgery safer and recovery more successful.
Fun food fact: CURE serves 630,000+ meals each year, feeding 100,000+ people on average annually!
At least 1 in 5 Africans goes to bed hungry, and about 140 million people in Africa face acute food insecurity.
More About Nutritional Support
Every CURE hospital has a kitchen where trained kitchen staff prepare three meals a day. All patients and caregivers eat their meals in the ward.
To endure and recover from surgery, proper nutrition and health are essential. That’s why, once a patient is admitted to a CURE hospital, they receive three age-appropriate meals a day. Our on-staff nutritionists ensure every patient gets the ideal balance of foods and liquids to maintain a healthy weight and prepare their bodies for surgery. Sometimes patients also have specific nutritional deficiencies (for example, they may be low in vitamins B-12, C, or D), so we identify those and respond accordingly by prescribing supplements and other nutrients as needed.
Unfortunately, CURE cannot do much to help if there is a lack of food in a patient’s community. However, we do inform caregivers about proper nutrition and offer guidance about how to meet patients’ nutritional needs so they remain strong and healthy as they heal following surgery.