About

Qualifications: MSc Nutritional Medicine, BSc (Hons) Health Sciences: Nutritional Therapy

After a long career in the health and beauty industry, I went to university to study nutrition, and I have been practicing since 2002. For eight years, I was the Senior Nutritional Therapist at London’s prestigious fertility and pregnancy Zita West Clinic, designing the nutrition programme for the clinic, and seeing thousands of clients. I also worked at a private GP practice for five years, which was a huge learning experience, and for a complete change I taught cooking skills to teenagers with learning difficulties for a small charity called Foundations. In 2009 I joined the team at In:Spa, consulting clients on retreats in Morocco, Spain and France, and a year later I decided to go out on my own specialising in pre-conception, IVF and pregnancy nutrition, working in Central London. For five years, I wrote regularly for the Sunday Telegraph Stella Magazine Q&A health page, and for Harper’s Bazaar Online and I wrote the Nutrition chapter for the book Female Infertility: Basic Science and Clinical Practice edited by Bryan Woodward and Jayant Mehta published in 2018. I am currently writing a book on how to improve male fertility with the urologist and male fertility expert, Jonathan Ramsay, and the mens health expert Dr Anand Patel.

As well as consulting clients on both improving their natural fertility and preparing for IVF, I am particularly interested in endometriosis and PCOS and the effect of nutrition on ameliorating their negative effects on fertility. My Masters studies have given me the most up to date evidence-based information that is so important for my clients, and my final thesis researched the effect of obesity and diet on male fertility. I feel very strongly that male factor infertility is very poorly addressed and I want to be in a position to highlight this to doctors and IVF clinics as I have seen the positive effects of diet and lifestyle changes on sperm quality with so many of my clients.

Although my specialist area is undoubtedly in pre-conceptual and pregnancy nutrition, including weight loss (and gain) and immune issues, my experience has helped me develop sound evidence-based advice for all hormonal conditions including the menopause (I ran a menopause clinic at the Zita West Clinic). And my work for GPs and studies has hugely consolidated my advice for other conditions from digestive problems to cardio-vascular issues such as high cholesterol, type II diabetes and high blood pressure, which sometimes accompany infertility.

Above all I am not a hard-core kill joy; I like my wine, chocolate, roast potatoes and croissants and I hope that one of my most highly regarded skills is my ability to make clients feel thoroughly relaxed and to really enjoy their consultations. I want you to feel that you are adding good things to your diet, not taking them away and generally making your life a misery! I also give you rationale; by being able to understand why some things help your fertility and some may not be so good just makes it much easier to adapt to new, healthier habits. It’s a project essentially and I endeavour to give ideas that fit in with your life, with recipes and tips that actually help you to leave the consultations feeling quite excited.