Canadian Food and Nutrition Information
for the Internationally Educated Registered Nurse

Canadian food and nutrition information is essential if you want to pass the questions on the Canadian Registered Nurse Exam.

The Canada Food Guide is the foundation for understanding recommended nutritional guidelines using common foods in Canada.

If you are a registered nurse from another country the food and nutrition questions on the CRNE may be present a challenge if you are not familiar with common food items on a Canadian menu.

When you are to implement teaching about the DASH diet will you know what that means?

When you write the Canadian Registered Nurse Exam will you:

• select brussels sprouts for the question on helping a patient select a high potassium food


• select "lifesavers" as an appropriate food to give a child suffering a hypoglycemic reaction?


• select the answer that suggests the patient should put "crackers" in his soup when he is following a low sodium diet?

A registered nurse educated outside of Canada will usually know what specific diet alteration is necessary for specified medical diagnoses but picking out appropriate foods from a Canadian menu might be a challenge.

If you do not know what these foods are then you could not know that they are all high potassium foods.

Go through this list of high potassium foods and note any food items that you are not familiar with and look them up so that you become familiar with common nutritional value of Canadian food.

Don't fail the Canadian Registered Nurse Exam because you are not familiar with common Canadian food items and their nutritional value!

Sample Canadian Registered Nurse Exam competency

HW-37 promotes healthy habits related to nutrition (e.g., breastfeeding, using and adapting the Canada Food Guide to cultural and economic situation).

Sample nutrition question to test this competency:

The patient is being discharged on furosemide. Which of the following foods will the nurse recommend that the patient eats on a daily basis?

a. cantaloupe
b. apples
c. rice
d. peanut butter

Of course you want to pick the high potassium food but if you have never seen a cantaloupe you might not know that it is high in potassium.

In the sample question you know you should be teaching the patient to eat more high potassium foods but if you do not recognize the foods in the questions on the Canadian Registered Nurse Exam you do not have a good chance of selecting the right answer.

The best source of information about Canadian food and nutrition is the Canada Food guide.

Other nutritional information that you should know:

The incidence of peanut allergy is increasing at an alarming rate in Canada.

Some peanut allergies are so severe that schools have adopted a "peanut free" policy.

In a peanut free zone children with a peanut allergy do not have to worry that they will be exposed to peanut products brought in by other children.

A peanut allergy can be so severe in some children that they can go into anaphylaxis if another child in the room opens up a peanut butter sandwich!

Read more about peanut allergy on these websites.

Health Canada

Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

• french fries are called "fries" or "chips"


• most Canadians will follow the British custom and drink tea with milk and sugar. Coffee is also popular


• salt substitutes are available for purchase and are used by those trying to follow a low sodium diet, however, they are very high in potassium and should not be used by patients who must restrict their potassium intake.


• soda or soda pop are not the terms used to refer to bottled, sweetened, and carbonated beverages. Canadians use the term pop.


• hard biscuits are called "crackers".
  
  

Soup is commonly served with crackers, The crackers are crumbled and put on top of the soup. This is called "soup and crackers".

Cheese is also commonly served with crackers and "cheese and crackers" is a popular snack.