Dr Vicki McWilliam

Vicki’s key area of expertise is paediatric food allergy. She is the dietitian for the Department of Allergy and Immunology at the Royal Children’s Hospital where her role involves patient care, teaching, training, resource development and research. Vicki’s expertise in food allergy sees her involved in food allergy training of dietitians, nurses and doctors and she is a frequently invited to participate in conferences, training sessions, and resource development in the area of food allergy. She is the current Victorian convenor of the Dietitian food allergy interest group and is a past chair of the dietitian subcommittee of ASCIA. She has also contributed a chapter to a textbook on food allergy and has been in involved in food allergy research. She is currently completing her PhD in food allergy with the Centre for Food and Allergy Research based at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and the University of Melbourne. Vicki has extensive experience in all areas of paediatric food allergy including not only how to safely avoid the foods that your child is allergic too but how to ensure your child receives the optimal nutrition they need from the foods they can eat. She focuses not only on the nutritional side of eating but the developmental issues as well. Many of the children she sees have limited diets and or difficult eating behaviours. Vicki has a very practical approach with lots of meal and snack ideas as well as how to source specialised food products and interpret food labels correctly for food allergies. Being a dietitian Vicki, not surprisingly, has a passion for food and loves to cook or eat out with friends and family. She tries to balance a love of food, wine and chocolate with running and group training sessions!