Registered dietitian and oncology nutritionist Julie Lanford discusses ways for cancer patients to stimulate appetite and strategies for improving calorie intake to help maintain wellness. 

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Transcript:

Lisa Hatfield:

Managing appetite loss during cancer treatment can be a significant challenge, but are there strategies that can help? In this Patient Empowerment Network RESTORE program, we’ll explore practical tips and techniques to help stimulate appetite and hopefully make mealtimes more enjoyable.

Julie, what are some effective ways to stimulate appetite during cancer treatment? And are there specific foods or meal strategies that can help make eating a little bit more appealing? 

Julie Lanford:

Yeah, so I think the most effective way is to allow yourself the freedom to eat what sounds good to you, no matter the time of day or whether it’s a food that typically goes at that time of day. So for people who are facing appetite challenges, remembering that any food is better than no food lowers the bar on your expectations. I think a lot of people get caught up in like, well, I should only eat “healthy foods.”

Well, at this point, if you are in a position where you don’t have much appetite, I just want to remind you that any food is better than no food. So things like milkshakes are okay. If that’s all that sounds good to you, go ahead and eat them. All the things that maybe you historically might not have let yourself or your children consume at breakfast, you could just go ahead and, like, throw the rules out and give yourself the freedom to eat anything that sounds good to you, which can be kind of fun, I think, in a way. It’s not fun to not feel like eating, so I think that is a significant issue.

And then, so I would say don’t eat your favorite foods, thinking that you might not tolerate them so well. But anything that sounds like you could get it down would be my first thing to think of. And then there are some strategies around meals that can help.

If you notice that you tend to be able to eat soft foods better than foods you have to chew a lot, then we might suggest more of a soft food or liquid diet. If you notice that hot foods don’t go so well for you or cold foods don’t, then finding either room temperature foods or hot foods or cold foods, depending on what it is. I think so those are kind of sensory-type things. And then the other thing is just that we know that yellow and red colors can help stimulate the appetite. McDonald’s and Burger King aren’t stupid. They have chosen colors for a reason.

So we will also recommend, like, do you have plates or cups or table, table, I say tablecloths, if you have placemats in that color, so yellow or red, that can sometimes help just, like, give one little extra boost that your appetite needs to get to get that down. There are some medications that can help with appetite. Of course, there are always side effects. And for a lot of people in cancer treatment, it’s like you’re already on so many medications. Do you want to spend one more? 

So I do like trying out all these other strategies first to see if we can sort of put together some kind of formula that works for you, that just gets you enough motivation or your body enough receptivity to the food to get it down and meet your needs. But if those aren’t working, definitely talk to your medical team about what types of pharmaceutical options might be available to help get that food down. 

Lisa Hatfield:

Okay, thank you. And just a side tip that I learned from an occupational therapist, she told me if I either have a bread maker or can borrow a bread maker that the smell of fresh baked bread can sometimes stimulate appetite. So I didn’t have a problem with appetite on my high dose steroid days, but otherwise I did and it did seem to help and maybe just feeling like I was productive and made a loaf of bread helped too.

But anyway, that’s just a tip for patients, they might want to try it also for stimulating appetite.

Julie Lanford:

Yeah. And then you have fresh bread, and that’s amazing. 

Lisa Hatfield:

Great, yeah.

Julie Lanford:

Fresh food itself that can really be much more appetizing than something that’s maybe not so fresh.

Lisa Hatfield:

Right. Yeah. Thank you. Julie, are there specific types of foods or meal patterns that might help make eating more appealing and manageable? 

Julie Lanford:

Yeah, I think that, again giving yourself freedom on the food choice, but also give yourself freedom on the portion sizes of food. So what you might be used to is larger portions on your plate, but maybe you can’t tolerate a lot at a time. Your stomach is just not settling so well, and you need to eat smaller amounts more frequently.

So often setting a timer for every two to three hours and eating a small amount each of those times might be more effective at meeting your calorie needs without causing too much overfullness for your appetite. And then making sure that the foods you consume are as high-calorie as possible. So choosing the higher fat versions of things, choosing the things that don’t have artificial sweeteners in them, because we are going to want all the calories possible in the food choices that you eat, especially if you’re not able to eat as much volume as you have been before.

And then using beverages to get extra calories in is also important. So it can hydrate you, but also provide extra calories. So juices, milk, even some of like Gatorade will give you a little bit of calories in with those electrolytes. So those are types of things. And then, of course, protein shakes or any types of smoothies you can make yourself will help get extra calories in.

Lisa Hatfield:

Okay, thank you. You heard it here from the expert. Thanks for joining this RESTORE program. I’m your host, Lisa Hatfield.