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Published: 26 September 2019, Thursday
Giving better means giving the needy what they need. Our latest effort in curating a healthier food pack specially for needy dialysis patients aims to do just that.
This curated food pack will start the first of its monthly distributions in October 2019 to 150 beneficiaries as part of Food from the Heart's long-standing Community Food Pack (CFP) programme. It contains 12 items, including fresh vegetables, fruit and eggs, curated with guidance from dieticians from the National Kidney Foundation to provide beneficiaries with more wholesome nutrition.
Mr Tim Oei, Chief Executive Officer of NKF, said, “Dietary requirement for dialysis patients is different from the general population as their kidneys are no longer functioning at its full capacity. The collaboration with Food from the Heart enables us to better support and care for our dialysis patients on their rehabilitative care journey, by ensuring that they get the right kind of food rations suitable for their diet, which had been selected in consultation with our Dieticians. To this, we are thankful to Food from the Heart and its sponsors.”
“To be a truly beneficiary-centric charity, we constantly look for ways to enhance our programmes so that our food packs can meet needs. Conversations with and feedback from our community partners and beneficiaries provide a strong foundation and a more in-depth understanding of dietary preferences, restrictions and patterns. Our team worked closely with NKF dieticians when curating the food pack, paying most attention to the special dietary requirements of the dialysis patients," says Ms Sim Bee Hia, CEO, Food from the Heart.
OCBC has contributed $50,000 to help Food from the Heart kickstart this initiative for eight months till May 2020 under its #OCBCCares Programme. Ms Koh Ching Ching, OCBC Bank’s Head of Group Brand and Communications shares, “We are happy to support Food from the Heart’s initiative to provide healthy food options for the needy. This is especially important for individuals suffering from kidney failure, who need to consume food with high-quality protein as these produce less waste for removal during dialysis.”
FFTH hopes to receive more support from donors and sponsors to keep such monthly food distributions sustainable, including scaling up the healthier food pack programme to other needy dialysis patients so that more can benefit.
To encourage healthy cooking efforts that make use of the food pack items, FFTH partnered with MasterChef Singapore finalist Shamsydar Ani, to create four easy-to-follow recipes for beneficiaries using ingredients from the curated food packs. These recipe cards will be added to the food packs and distributed to the beneficiaries in October.