Oncology Nutrition & Cancer Care
Good nutrition plays a vital role throughout cancer care — but it’s not always easy.
Between treatment side effects, appetite changes, and overwhelming information, eating well can start to feel complicated.
That’s where I come in. I provide compassionate, evidence-based nutrition care tailored to your unique diagnosis, treatment, and goals — helping you stay nourished, strong, and supported before, during, and after treatment.
What Does an Oncology Dietitian Actually Do?
If your oncologist or GP has suggested seeing a dietitian and you're not quite sure what that involves — you're not the first! Many people aren't sure what to expect, or whether nutrition really makes a difference alongside everything else that's happening.
An oncology dietitian is a specialist in the nutritional needs of people living with and beyond cancer. Where a general dietitian supports a wide range of health conditions, an oncology dietitian focuses specifically on how cancer and its treatments affect the way your body uses food — and how to work with those changes in a way that's grounded in current science and tailored to your situation.
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Oncology nutrition is a rapidly evolving field. Research into areas like body composition and muscle preservation during treatment, the role of nutrition in supporting immunotherapy response, metabolic changes in cancer cachexia, and the gut microbiome's relationship with treatment tolerance is moving quickly — and the evidence base is genuinely shifting what best practice looks like. Staying across that research, understanding where the evidence is strong versus still emerging, and translating it into practical guidance that makes sense for a real person going through treatment — that's a core part of the role.
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In practice, that means different things at different stages of your journey. Before treatment, the focus is often on building nutritional reserves and physical resilience so your body is as prepared as it can be. During treatment — whether chemotherapy, radiation, immunotherapy, or surgery — it shifts to managing side effects like nausea, taste changes, appetite loss, swallowing difficulties, or digestive disruption, and keeping you as nourished as possible through the harder stretches. After treatment, the work turns to recovery — rebuilding muscle, restoring energy, addressing longer-term changes to digestion or body composition, and finding your way back to enjoying food again.
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Along the way, an oncology dietitian also helps you navigate the noise. There's a significant amount of conflicting information circulating about diet and cancer — from ketogenic and fasting protocols to superfoods, supplements, and 'anti-cancer' elimination diets. Some of this sits within genuinely interesting areas of emerging research; much of it doesn't apply to most people or lacks the clinical evidence to recommend in practice. Part of the role is helping you understand the difference — what's supported by current evidence, what's being actively researched, and what's worth setting aside — so you can make informed decisions without spending your limited energy chasing approaches that aren't right for your situation.
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Every appointment is built around your diagnosis, your treatment plan, your symptoms, and your life. There's no one-size-fits-all answer in oncology nutrition — just practical, personalised support that meets you where you are, informed by the best available evidence and an honest conversation about what we know and what we're still learning.
Cancer and its treatments can affect metabolism, appetite, digestion, taste, weight and our body composition. With the right support, nutrition can become one part of treatment that feels within your control.
Early and consistent dietitian support helps you:
Maintain muscle mass and strength
Improve tolerance to treatments
Manage side effects such as nausea, taste changes, or swallowing pain
Support immune function and recovery
Reduce unplanned hospitalisations and treatment interruptions
Evidence shows: Early nutrition intervention improves outcomes and enhances quality of life during and post treatment.
Why Nutrition
Matters
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Every cancer diagnosis is different, and so is the nutrition support that goes with it. Below is an overview of the cancer types and treatment contexts I work with regularly — along with the kinds of nutritional challenges that commonly arise and how I can help. If your diagnosis isn't listed here, please don't hesitate to get in touch. My experience spans a wide range of cancer types.
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Nutrition is one of the most complex and time-sensitive challenges in head and neck cancer care. Treatments involving radiation, surgery, or combined chemoradiation can significantly affect swallowing, saliva production, taste, and the ability to eat normally. I support clients through mucositis management, radiation-induced dysphagia, taste and texture changes, tube feeding (including NGT, PEG, and PEGJ), and the gradual transition back to oral intake after treatment. I work closely with speech pathologists and treating teams to ensure nutrition care is coordinated with swallowing rehabilitation.
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GI cancers — including colorectal, oesophageal, gastric, pancreatic, and liver cancers — often involve significant changes to digestion, absorption, and bowel function. I have experience supporting clients through bowel resections, gastrectomy, stoma nutrition (including high output ileostomy management and electrolyte replacement), short bowel syndrome risk, dumping syndrome, malabsorption, pancreatic enzyme insufficiency, and the nutritional management of bowel changes during and after treatment. Stoma formation carries real risk of sodium, magnesium, and fluid depletion — particularly when concurrent chemotherapy agents like oxaliplatin are involved — and this is an area where specialist guidance makes a measurable difference.
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I support clients navigating chemotherapy-related appetite changes and fatigue, treatment-induced menopause and its effects on body composition and bone health, weight and muscle changes during hormone therapy, and the longer-term nutritional picture in survivorship. There's also a significant amount of circulating misinformation around diet and breast cancer — from soy and dairy myths to specific elimination approaches — and helping clients navigate that landscape with clarity and confidence is a meaningful part of the work.
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Item descriptionI have experience working with clients through intensive chemotherapy regimens, bone marrow transplantation, neutropenic diet guidance, mucositis and gastrointestinal toxicity, and the extended recovery period post-transplant. I also work with clients navigating premalignant haematological conditions including MGUS and MGRS — conditions that sit at the intersection of haematology and renal health, where nutritional considerations span both renal dietary management and the broader question of what dietary factors may influence inflammatory load and longer-term haematological risk.
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Cancer-related malnutrition and muscle wasting (cachexia) are particularly prevalent in lung cancer. I support clients managing appetite suppression, early satiety, fatigue, and the nutritional demands of treatments including chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and thoracic surgery. As immunotherapy becomes increasingly central to lung cancer treatment, the emerging evidence around nutrition's role in supporting immune function and treatment response is an area I follow closely and incorporate into practice where the evidence supports it.
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I support clients through surgery and recovery, radiation-related bowel changes, chemotherapy side effect management, and the nutritional aspects of hormonal changes associated with treatment. Body composition, bone health, and long-term metabolic health are important considerations in gynaecological cancer survivorship.
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I work with clients to preserve muscle mass and functional strength, support bone health through nutrition, manage weight and metabolic risk, and navigate the often confusing landscape of dietary claims around prostate cancer. The evidence in this space is genuinely developing, and I aim to provide guidance that's honest about what we know, what's promising, and what's not yet supported.
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I also work regularly with clients across a range of other diagnoses including sarcoma, thyroid cancer, skin cancers, brain tumours, and cancers of unknown primary — as well as people managing rare or complex presentations. If your diagnosis isn't covered above, please reach out.
Cancer Types & Diagnoses
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Cancer treatment isn't one experience — it's many, often overlapping, and each modality brings its own nutritional challenges. Here's what nutrition support typically looks like across each treatment type.
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Nutrition support during chemotherapy focuses on maintaining adequate intake through the harder days, protecting muscle mass, and adapting strategies as your symptoms fluctuate week to week. Patients increasingly ask about metabolic dietary approaches — ketogenic diets, fasting protocols, fasting-mimicking diets, and various strategies grounded in the Warburg effect and cancer metabolism research. This is an area of genuinely active and evolving research, and my approach is to engage seriously with this evidence rather than dismiss it — helping you understand what's genuinely supported, what's promising but preliminary, and what carries nutritional risk in the context of your specific treatment.
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The nutritional impact of radiation depends significantly on the treatment site. Radiation to the head and neck region carries some of the most significant nutritional risks of any treatment in oncology. Nutrition support during radiation is most effective when it begins before treatment rather than waiting for side effects to develop — early intervention allows us to build reserves, establish strategies, and have a plan in place before the most challenging weeks arrive.
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Immunotherapy is one of the most rapidly evolving areas of cancer treatment. The emerging evidence around the gut microbiome and immunotherapy response is particularly compelling — with research suggesting that the composition of the gut microbiome may influence how well patients respond to certain immunotherapy agents. While this field is still developing, it's an area I follow closely and discuss transparently with clients — explaining where the evidence is strong, where it's promising but preliminary, and where the hype has outrun the science.
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Strong research supports both pre-operative nutritional optimisation (prehabilitation) and post-operative nutritional rehabilitation as key contributors to recovery outcomes. I have extensive experience with post-surgical nutrition across a range of oncological procedures, including gastrectomy, bowel resection, oesophagectomy, and head and neck surgical reconstruction — including tube feeding management, oral intake rehabilitation, and the longer-term nutritional consequences of altered anatomy and digestion.
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Targeted therapies are increasingly used across a wide range of cancer types, often alongside or instead of conventional chemotherapy. Their nutritional side effect profiles vary considerably depending on the specific agent and the pathway it targets. Common nutrition-relevant side effects include diarrhoea, nausea, fatigue, and metabolic effects — some of which require specific dietary adjustments or careful monitoring of nutritional status over time.
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Hormonal and endocrine therapies are used across several cancer types — most commonly breast, ovarian, and prostate cancers — and their nutritional and metabolic effects can be significant, persistent, and sometimes underestimated. Hormonal suppression creates a physiological environment with real consequences for body composition, bone health, metabolic function, and cardiovascular risk. Key areas include muscle loss and increased fat mass, reduced bone density, metabolic changes and insulin resistance, treatment-induced menopause, and longer-term weight management. The duration of hormonal therapy — often five to ten years or longer — means nutritional support in this setting is genuinely long-term work.
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In a palliative context, nutrition support is guided by what matters most to the person — whether that's managing symptoms that affect eating, finding foods that bring comfort and pleasure, supporting family members who want to help through food, or simply having an honest conversation about changing nutritional needs. There is no pressure, no targets to meet, and no judgement. The focus is entirely on dignity, comfort, and quality of life.
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Survivorship nutrition is an area I'm particularly passionate about. Questions about what to eat now, how to rebuild strength, what the research says about diet and cancer recurrence, and how to manage lasting changes to digestion or body composition are all common. My role is to help you build a sustainable, evidence-informed approach to eating that supports your long-term health without turning food into a source of anxiety.
Treatment Types
Post surgical nutrition and digestive changes
Optimising micronutrient intake
Undernutrition and low energy intake
Fatigue and low motivation for cooking
Tube feeding and transitions back to oral intake
Navigating misinformation or restrictive “anti-cancer” diets
Weight gain, body composition changes
Treatment induced menopause
If you’re not sure whether now is the right time to see a dietitian, here are some signs that extra nutrition support could really help.
Weight loss or reduced appetite
Taste and smell changes
Difficulty swallowing or mouth pain (e.g. radiation-induced oesophagitis)
Digestive symptoms: nausea, reflux, constipation, diarrhoea
Fibre and digestive support
When to see a Dietitian
My Approach
My approach combines many years of cancer care experience with warmth, practicality, and genuine care. I provide support that’s:
Personalised: Every plan is tailored to your treatment, symptoms, and food preferences.
Evidence-based: Guided by up-to-date, science-backed recommendations and best practice.
Collaborative: I work closely with your oncologist, nursing, allied health, GP, and wider care team.
Compassionate: I focus on achievable steps, not perfection — meeting you where you are..
I understand how much time and energy you invest in your health, and my goal is to help you make the most of it.
My role is to walk alongside you — helping you feel confident that what you eat is truly supporting your treatment and recovery.
I know this can be an overwhelming time, which is why I provide staged, tailored recommendations that are convenient, achievable, and aligned with your goals.
Together, we’ll build knowledge and practical steps that optimise your nutrition and give you confidence in your progress
Collaborating with Your Care Team
Nutrition care works best when everyone is on the same page.
I work closely with oncology treatment centres and healthcare teams across Sydney to ensure your care feels seamless and supported — before, during, and after treatment.
Current referral pathways include:
GenesisCare
Cancer Care Macarthur
Icon Cancer Care
Norwest Chemotherapy Infusion Unit
Clients can access private support through Upbeet Nutrition & Dietetics alongside their medical and allied health care.
Where possible, dietitian reviews are coordinated to align with your treatment schedule for convenience and continuity.
What to Expect from Your Appointment
Initial Consultation – Comprehensive Nutrition Assessment
Your first session is all about understanding you — your diagnosis, your current nutrition, and what matters most right now.
Together, we’ll create a practical plan that feels achievable and meaningful.
Your first session includes:
Pre-appointment intake form
Review of your diagnosis, treatment, and current nutrition intake
Screening for nutritional risk (e.g. PG-SGA)
Baseline body composition, hand grip strength, and/or other clinical measures
Goal setting and indicators of success
Tailored strategies aligned with your treatment plan
Meal and supplement recommendations
A written summary, updated meal plan, and action plan
Follow-Up Appointments
Nutrition needs can shift throughout treatment — that’s why regular reviews help keep things on track and adapt when your body or treatment plan changes.
Follow-ups allow us to monitor progress, adjust goals, and explore any challenges or successes along the way.
Repeat body composition and strength assessments can help track results and guide next steps.
Typical review schedules:
Weekly or fortnightly appointments during intensive treatment
Every 4–6 weeks or in line with treatment cycles for ongoing care
Looking for more details about what to expect? Find out more here
FAQs
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No referral is required for accessing privately funded appointments. Medicare rebates are available if you have a GP Chronic Disease Management Plan.
Referrals from your treating team/centres are encouraged for open communication and collaboration between services. -
Yes — we support clients Australia-wide via secure video consultations.
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Absolutely. We regularly communicate with treating oncologists, nurses, and speech pathologists.
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Yes — I have experience across a wide range of diagnoses and treatments. Including head & neck, breast, prostate, gastrointestinal, gynaecological, hematological and other cancers.
Book an
Appointment.
Ready to Begin?
Not sure whether nutrition support is right for you right now?
I’m happy to answer questions before you decide — or we can start with an initial consultation to see where you’re at.
You don’t have to face nutrition challenges alone — I’ll walk alongside you, every step of the way.
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Telehealth (Video) - Australia wide
Bella Vista
Campbelltown
Kingswood
Hurstville -
Submit your interest in working together by completing the following form here
Appointment offerings can be emailed, texted or given over the phone once your preferences are received.
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Email: upbeetdietetics@gmail.com
Mobile: 0434485070
Please leave a voicemail if I cant get to your call!