Application subjects for dietary health managers

The most common dietary health manager (health manager nutrition direction) recognized by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security as a third-party professional skill level takes 2 subjects, the industry-authoritative registered dietitian/technician certificate takes 2-4 subjects, and some job training certificates independently issued by formal institutions only take 1 subject.

To be honest, I have encountered too many candidates who came up and asked "which subjects to take?" They didn't even know what kind of certificate they wanted to take, and they were simply distracted by the agency's rhetoric. Let’s first talk about the grade certification certificate that is most popular and can be found on the Skilled Talent Evaluation Network. The two subjects are theoretical knowledge and operational skills. The full score is 100, and a passing score of 60 is sufficient. The theory tests are all objective questions, covering the basics of medicine, nutrition, food safety, dietary characteristics of different groups of people, and even some common sense about traditional Chinese medicine and diet therapy. The operational skills are much more flexible. When I was invigilating the exams in the past two years, I saw many people fail in this subject. For example, the exam question asked third-grade students to design a week's snacks between classes. Many people included whole nuts and jelly, which are easy to choke, and directly deducted half of the points. Some even added seafood and tofu soup to meals for gout patients. They just memorized knowledge points but could not use them. After passing this certificate, you can receive skills subsidies and can be used as settlement points in some cities. If you want to find a job in a community health post or a postpartum care center catering post, it is recognized enough.

If you want to take a more professional route, such as entering a hospital nutrition department or providing dietary guidance to a professional sports team, the one generally recognized in the industry is the registered dietitian/technician examination organized by the Chinese Nutrition Society. Many practitioners also call this a "professional-level dietary health manager." The registered dietitian exam consists of a comprehensive test with 200 multiple-choice questions covering the five modules of basic nutrition, clinical nutrition, food hygiene, public nutrition, and nutritional counseling and education. It seems to be one subject, but the density of knowledge points is greater than the two subjects recognized by the level combined. I have a friend who has been engaged in snack research and development for three years, and he specially prepared for the exam for four months before passing the exam. If you apply for the job competency training program under the Nutrition Society, you will also be given two additional practical exams: recipe preparation and nutrition intervention plan design. There are 3 subjects in total, which is suitable for people with no basic knowledge to learn step by step.

Of course, there are also many people who are not taking the exam to find a job, but just want to prepare meals for their own diabetic elderly, or to endorse their own light food restaurants. For this kind of job training certificates issued by formal industry associations or leading training institutions, most of them only take one comprehensive test, which is multiple choice. The test is practical content such as basic nutrition, food safety, and common dietary misunderstandings. If you study the question bank carefully for two weeks, you can basically pass it, and it is very cost-effective.

There is a lot of controversy over this matter in the industry now. Many colleagues in clinical nutrition believe that only registered dietitians can be considered serious diet health managers, and other certificates are just "cutting leeks." There are also many people who work in public health science and think that there is no need to force everyone to chew on obscure clinical knowledge. The best can be used. I have taught more than 20 exam preparation students myself, and to be honest, there is really no standard answer. If you just want to adjust the diet of your family, you don’t have to spend half a year memorizing knowledge about nutritional support for kidney disease patients. If you want to take the professional route, you must take the exam with high gold content. Don’t try to save trouble and take a certificate that is only recognized by the institution. Then you will not be able to find a job.

By the way, the last thing to mention is, don’t listen to the nonsense boasted by the institution that “the unified national examination only takes two subjects.” Before signing up, ask the issuing unit of the certificate and see if it can be found on the official website. Otherwise, it will be useless and you will waste your time and money.